Detroit Tigers’ Delmon Young lives up to Jim Leyland’s expectations – MLB Update
Delmon Young is fighting an oblique injury. He is struggling to run, failing to connect on the plate and has difficulties moving on the field.
Nevertheless, Detroit Tigers’ manager Jim Leyland had full confidence in his out-fielder and the player rightly showed why, influencing his team to a 7-5 win over Texas Rangers in Game 5 of the American League Championship Series, preventing elimination
and giving the Tigers a distant chance of bouncing back in the seven-game series.
After being scratched from the ALCS initially, Young was recalled to the line-up after Magglio Ordonez suffered a season-ending injury. He failed to deliver in the first few games, but came back strongly when the team needed him the most.
In three at-bats during Game 5, Young drove in three runs in addition to scoring two. His batting surged to .182 in the series which, comparing to league standards is still not decent. Nevertheless, these runs came in handy for the Tigers and proved to be
the differentiating factor between both teams.
Young’s first run came in the fourth inning, a home-run down left-field which helped the Tigers register a one-run lead over the AL West Champions. The Rangers drew level in the fifth inning, but a four-run sixth inning opened the game for Detroit and eventually
saw them prevail in what was a must-win game.
After Ryan Raburn and Miguel Cabrera scored in the sixth, Young replicated his fourth inning feat, only going one better with a two-run homer to virtually seal the encounter for Detroit.
Commenting on this effort, Cabrera admitted that the team got lucky, but this is what the Tigers need in abundance at this time. He further expressed his desire of overcoming the Rangers on Saturday and possibly taking the series to the stretch.
Leyland was relieved that his methodology proved to be right and that his team is now in with a chance of winning the pennant. "That's just the way it had to be today,” Leyland said. “We talked about it before the game and we did exactly what we felt we
had to do to give ourselves any chance to win the series."
It will be vital to see how the Tigers approach Game 6 of the ALCS. With Young probably back in his groove, the Tigers are surely not the underdogs.
http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/recap?gameId=311013106&teams=texas-rangers-vs-detroit-tigers
http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/boxscore?gameId=311013106&teams=texas-rangers-vs-detroit-tigers
http://scores.espn.go.com/mlb/scoreboard
Tags: