AJ Hinch Getting The Most Out Of This Team
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00:00And then you start dancing around, and this is what A.J. has done so masterfully.
00:06It's about the matchups. It's which arm do you want against these three batters?
00:12Or these six batters? And then it's what bats do we want against their pitchers?
00:18And it's a dance that A.J. has been able to dance that very few can do.
00:23I don't know if anybody else could have done it with this roster.
00:26No, again, we've chronicled it. They got 12 rookies, the two-man rotation.
00:31They sold at the deadline. They had to go on a miraculous 50-year run to get in the postseason.
00:36And it's pushing all the right buttons.
00:38And, you know, I wonder, there were some people that didn't like what A.J. did
00:42going to Foley in the ninth inning instead of keeping Holton out there.
00:46I wonder if we've just reached, like, hinge take the wheel.
00:49Like, you just don't question it at this point.
00:51Because I know there's this tendency to go, well, keep Holton in against Alvarez.
00:55Because that's a left-on-left. Why didn't they keep Holton in?
00:59Well, they would have had to keep him in for two batters,
01:01which would have kept him in for Bregman, which is left-on-right.
01:04And A.J. played the numbers. He played Foley.
01:08Alvarez is not as good against righties as he is lefties.
01:11A.J. played Foley. It was the right decision.
01:14And even when it started to look like the wrong decision, he got him out of the game.
01:17He got Briskey in the game, and they won.
01:19I'm not saying blind faith. Like, clearly, if there's a move he makes that doesn't add up,
01:22we'll discuss it. But I do feel like we're approaching blind faith with A.J. Hinch at this point.
01:27Just about. And I don't know if he would ever admit this,
01:32because it's all about winning yesterday's game.
01:36But was he in the back of his mind thinking,
01:39if I pull Tyler Holton now, I could pitch him as the starter tomorrow?
01:43I think it's a secondary benefit.
01:45It's a secondary benefit. There's no question.
01:47But how much of that entered his mind in regards to,
01:50I've got enough confidence in everybody else that I'm going to put in there
01:55that we are going to win this game.
01:57Now, there's no guarantees, but he had that confidence
02:01that if I pull Tyler Holton now, I can use him tomorrow,
02:04and we can get out of this with a win with everybody else.
02:07TicketTexture says, I get A.J. made the right calls,
02:10but, man, Malloy's bad.
02:12I love the Tigers, but he hasn't been good.
02:14The last month, I need to see Carpenter.
02:17Malloy went one for two and had a walk.
02:20He had a hell of a day.
02:21He's actually their best hitter against lefties, statistically.
02:24When Carp went in, he was 0 for right.
02:27Carp, yeah.
02:28They got him in for a righty, and he had two at-bats,
02:31and he didn't do anything.
02:33A.J. is going to... I don't understand it.
02:36What they've done is they've optimized the entire roster.
02:39All 26 guys are going to be utilized.
02:41What team starts the game is not going to be the team that ends the game.
02:44They're using their entire roster,
02:45which is why you put an emphasis on having a really good manager.
02:48TicketTexture says, I agree with what you guys are saying.
02:50The Tigers belong.
02:52Yesterday was more than just vibes.
02:54It's fundamentally sound baseball.
02:57ALDS on Alliance Bye Week?
02:59Yes, please.
03:02Says, I'm surprised you're not giving Will Vest a little more love.
03:06Says, that guy was dominant.
03:08Johnny had four strikeouts against five batters.
03:10Yeah, he was.
03:13There's plenty of guys that we could talk about and give credit to.
03:18Have we talked enough about the guys that came up with two outs in the second?
03:23No.
03:24And been able to get hits?
03:25But that's the thing about this group effort.
03:29It's the undecided.
03:31It's the lineup.
03:34It only works the way A.J.'s put it together,
03:38and it only works in concert with all of those decisions.
03:43Yeah, I mean, it's your 8-9 hitters
03:47that delivered early in that game,
03:49and obviously Verling, too, for the third run.
03:52But your 8-9-1 hitters with two outs,
03:56I mean, that's scrappy.
03:57That's the definition of gritty Tigers.
03:59I mean, it's classic this baseball team.
04:01I mean, there were stretches this year where we didn't think they had
04:04five good hitters,
04:06and we got 8-9 driving in runs in a playoff game.