DETROIT — Tough game.

On yet another day when the Tigers struggled mightily to produce any kind of offense, Kerry Carpenter slammed a 414-foot triple in the second inning and a game-tying RBI double off the left-field wall in the sixth. But when his next turn to bat came around, manager AJ Hinch called him back to the dugout and sent up Matt Vierling to pinch-hit.

"I trust Vierling," Carpenter said. "Everybody trusts Vierling. And we trust AJ with the lineup. Vierling tends to get it done. So, I love it."

Vierling and Gio Urshela, both right-handed hitters, slapped opposite-field singles to right field off lefty reliever Jacob Latz and the Tigers broke a 2-2 tie and beat the Texas Rangers 4-2 before a small crowd of 10,377 at Comerica Park Tuesday.

"We all are accepting our roles well," Carpenter said. "That's the way it should be. If we can tag-team a game, then that's good. Hey, we love going three for four out of the four hole."

This was the fourth game this season the Tigers won after trailing in the sixth, seventh or eighth inning. They are 7-2 in games decided by one or two runs. And they are doing that despite some severe offensive struggles.

"We were all as a team watching the Red Wings last night," Hinch said of the Wings' dramatic overtime win against Montreal. "So we took a page out of their playbook and waited until the very end and made everyone nervous and then came through with the win.

"It's a good time to be in Detroit."

Playing all 27 outs is becoming more than a cliche. It's becoming a character trait.

"Sometimes you wish you could win big every now and then," joked starting pitcher Casey Mize, who in his first start at Comerica Park since April 9, 2022 allowed just two runs in six innings. "But it's all the emotions of baseball and we've experienced them a lot. That's what makes it fun. Coming out on this side of it is good.

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