Canadian rookie Cade Smith earns win as Guardians blank Tigers in ALDS opener

Lane Thomas hit a three-run homer in a five-run outburst before Detroit got an out, and the Cleveland Guardians unleashed their lights-out bullpen to complete a four-hitter in a 7-0 win over the visiting Tigers in an AL Division Series opener on Saturday.

Thomas’s shot — on his first career post-season swing — helped the Guardians cool off the Tigers, who stormed into the playoffs with a second-half surge before sweeping AL West champion Houston in the wild-card round.

Tanner Bibee pitched four 2/3 innings before Guardians manager Stephen Vogt swung the door open to baseball’s best bullpen to finish off the Tigers. Relievers combined for four 1/3 hitless innings to finish and match the largest shutout victory margin in club post-season history.

Detroit struck 13 out times and didn’t get a runner past first in the final four innings.

Cleveland’s bullpen was as advertised. Canadian rookie Cade Smith (1-0) replaced Bibee and struck out all four batters. Tim Herrin took care of the seventh, Hunter Gaddis the eighth, and Emmanuel Clase, who led the AL with 47 saves, worked the ninth.

David Fry added a two-run, sixth-inning double for the AL Central champion Guardians, who were unaffected by not playing for almost a week with a first-round bye.

Game 2 is Monday, when the Tigers will turn to Tarik Skubal, the favourite to win the AL Cy Young Award, to try and even the best-of-five series.

The 2,327th meeting between Detroit and Cleveland was the first between the franchises and Central division rivals in the post-season.

It was as good as over after one inning.

Tigers manager A.J. Hinch has made the right decisions for months as his young club went from being under .500 at the trade deadline to qualifying for the post-season with a 33-13 flourish since Aug. 11.

Hinch used his bullpen in Game 1 from the start and it backfired.

The Guardians sent nine batters to the plate in the first with Thomas’s moon shot into the left-field bleachers opening the 5-0 lead. Cleveland became the first team in AL post-season history to score five runs before recording an out.

Steven Kwan got it rolling with a leadoff double against Tigers starter Tyler Holton (0-1) and Fry walked. Jose Ramirez followed with a hard hopper to third that Zach McKinstry misplayed for an error, allowing Kwan to score.

Josh Naylor hits RBI single

Canadian Josh Naylor’s RBI single made it 2-0 and Hinch pulled Holton after just four batters to bring in Reese Olson — the move blew up in seconds.

Thomas, who batted just .143 with 33 strikeouts in his first month with Cleveland after being acquired from Washington in July, made his first post-season at-bat with the Guardians unforgettable.

He turned on Olson’s first pitch — a slider down the heart of the plate — and launched it over the wall, sending the majority of 33,548 fans inside Progressive Field into a frenzy.

Bibee admitted feeling nerves ahead of the opener, and he showed some in the first.

He gave up a one-out single and hit Riley Greene with two outs, prompting a visit from pitching coach Carl Willis. Bibee got Colt Keith on a lazy fly for the final out on his 27th pitch.

Taking the mound in the second with a five-run lead helped Bibee settle in. The right-hander gave up four hits and struck out six.

Yankees 6, Royals 5

Alex Verdugo hit a tiebreaking single in the seventh inning and saved at least one run with a sliding catch along the left-field line, boosting the New York Yankees over the visiting Kansas City Royals 6-5 on Saturday night in their AL Division Series opener.

New York’s Gleyber Torres and Kansas City’s MJ Melendez hit two-run homers in a back-and-forth game in which the Royals wasted leads of 1-0, 3-2 and 5-4 and the Yankees failed to hold 2-1 and 4-3 margins. It was the first post-season game with five lead changes, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Kansas City pitchers tied their season high with eight walks, forcing in a pair of runs in the fifth inning. The Yankees were just one for 11 with runners in scoring position before Verdugo lined a single off loser Michael Lorenzen.

Verdugo’s hit scored Jazz Chisholm Jr., who singled leading off and stole second on a play allowed to stand following a video review. Yankees manager Aaron Boone started Verdugo in left over rookie Jasson Dominguez in a defense-influenced decision. Verdugo entered the game in a two-for-34 skid at the plate.

With the Yankees trailing 3-2, Verdugo made a sliding catch on Michael Massey’s fourth-inning fly just inside the line to strand two runners. The ball hit Verdugo’s right wrist just below his glove and bounced off his chest before he grabbed it with his bare left hand.

Chisholm, playing third base this year for the first time after the Yankees acquired him from Miami at the July trade deadline, made three fine defensive plays, two with the help of first baseman Oswaldo Cabrera, starting because of Anthony Rizzo’s fractured fingers.

Four Yankees relievers combined to allow only an unearned run over four innings after ace Gerrit Cole came out, unhappy with his performance. Clay Holmes, dropped from his closer’s job last month, worked 1 2/3 innings for the win. Luke Weaver got four straight outs for the save in his post-season debut.

Yankees star Aaron Judge went zero for four with three strikeouts, and Royals standout Bobby Witt Jr. was zero for five, barking at plate umpire Adam Hamari after a called third strike in the ninth.

Juan Soto went three for five and threw out Salvador Perez in the second inning trying to score from second on Melendez’s single to right. Kansas City first baseman Yuli Gurriel threw out runners at the plate on grounders in the first and fifth.

After a day off between Games 1 and 2, the series between the AL-best Yankees and wild-card Royals resumes Monday night. These teams met in four playoffs from 1976-80, with the Yankees winning the first three and getting swept in the last.

Mets 6, Phillies 2

Mark Vientos and Brandon Nimmo keyed another comeback in New York’s electric run through the National League playoffs, helping the Mets break through for five runs in the eighth inning against a pair of all-star relievers as they rallied for a 6-2 win Saturday over the host Philadelphia Phillies in Game 1 of their Division Series.

The Mets had been stymied by Phillies ace Zack Wheeler, held to just one hit while trailing 1-0 and unable to muster any real scoring chances over the first seven innings.

With Wheeler lifted after nine strikeouts and a startling 30 swings-and-misses over 111 pitches, the Mets — whose whirlwind week included a victory in a makeup doubleheader at Atlanta to clinch a post-season spot and three games in the Wild Card Series at Milwaukee — pounced against Phillies relievers Jeff Hoffman and Matt Strahm in the eighth.

In true New York fashion this October, the Mets had to rally, not just on the scoreboard, but on a gut-check in each each at-bat.

Francisco Alvarez hit a leadoff single against Hoffman before three straight batters reached base after facing 0-2 counts. Francisco Lindor worked a walk from his 0-2 count and Vientos followed with a tying single. Nimmo laced a go-ahead single off Strahm past a drawn-in infield for the 2-1 lead.

Dodgers 7, Padres 5

Shohei Ohtani hit a three-run home run in the first playoff game of his career and the Los Angeles Dodgers rallied for a 7-5 victory over the San Diego Padres in Game 1 of their National League Division Series.

Teoscar Hernandez delivered a go-ahead two-run single in the fourth as the Dodgers ended a six-game postseason losing streak that extended to the 2022 NLDS when they were eliminated by the Padres.

Five Los Angeles relievers combined for six scoreless innings with Blake Treinen going 1 2/3 innings to earn the save, ending the game with a strikeout of Manny Machado with two runners on base. Ryan Brasier (1-0) earned the win by giving up one hit over 1 2/3 innings.

Machado hit a two-run home run in the first inning and Xander Bogaerts had a two-run double in the third but the Padres lost their third consecutive game against the Dodgers going back to the regular season.

Fernando Tatis Jr. scored a pair of runs for San Diego, which won eight of the 13 games between the teams in the regular season.

The Padres took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on an RBI ground out from Jurickson Profar. One batter later, Machado hit his two-run home run for a 3-0 lead.

The Dodgers tied it in the second when Will Smith walked, Gavin Lux singled and, two outs later, Ohtani ripped a fastball over the wall in right field. The home run came after Ohtani hit a National League-best 54 in the regular season to begin a 10-year, $700-millon contract.

One inning later, the Padres moved back on top 5-3 on Bogaerts’ two-run double. The Dodgers responded in the fourth, loading the bases on three consecutive singles, the third from Ohtani. Tommy Edman scored on a wild pitch by Adrian Morejon (0-1) before Hernandez hit his two-run single to right for a 6-5 advantage.

The Dodgers added a run in the fifth when Will Smith scored on Edman’s double-play ground ball.

The Padres loaded the bases in the eighth inning on three walks, including two off right-hander Michael Kopech, before Treinen struck out Donovan Solano to end the threat.

Neither starter was sharp, with Dodgers right-hander Yoshinobu Yamamoto lasting three innings, giving up five runs on five hits with two walks and a strikeout. Padres right-hander Dylan Cease was charged with five runs on six hits over 3 1/3 innings with two walks and five strikeouts.