What A.J. Hinch is saying about Detroit Tigers' struggles: 'It's important to be steady'

Yahoo

7 days ago

The Detroit Tigers have lost 11 of their last 12 games.
They've won just once in the past 17 days.
The Tigers (60-45) had a 59-34 record in their first 93 games, followed by a 1-11 record in their last 12 games. The lead in the American League Central has dropped from 14 games to 7½ games, with 57 games remaining. Since July 9, the offense ranks 30th among the 30 MLB teams with a .598 OPS, while the pitching also ranks 30th with a 6.90 ERA.
As the losses pile up, here's everything Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said Friday, July 25 — both before and after a 6-2 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays at Comerica Park:
[ MUST LISTEN: Make "Days of Roar" your go-to Detroit Tigers podcast, available anywhere you listen to podcasts (Apple, Spotify) ]
How do you manage the team through a stretch like this?
"I think it's important to be steady. I've never been on a team that hasn't gone through a little bit of something at some point. There is no easy 162-game schedule. If you look at the American League right now, the teams that have gotten to or eclipsed 60 wins, as an example, have all gotten there in different ways, and they've run through the questioning from, what's going on with their team to, oh my gosh, this is the best team in the league, to anywhere in between. A steady approach works. It's not always easy. It's not always the most popular because you want this massive reaction one way or the other. We've got to play the game that's in front of us today. There's nothing we can do about the previous X-amount of games. If you want to go back one series, two series, three series, four series — eventually, you're going to get back to a time where we were dominating series. The steadiness is what these guys are looking for. As a leader, the first thing they're going to look at is my mood that day and the edge that I bring. I've got to separate the edge of what's happened with the edge of the competition. I always have an edge because of the competition, but it's not because we won or lost yesterday. I've tried to establish that as part of our identity for these exact moments. I've managed 100-plus win teams that have gone through six- and seven- and eight-game losing streaks, or lost 12 of 13. You don't think of that because we forget over time. There's going to be a time that we all forget about this. It's just not right now when you're going through it. You feel like you're getting suffocated day by day where the first thing that goes wrong brings back the thoughts of previous games. Welcome to sports. It's an emotional ride. Those that stay steady will survive."
MORE ABOUT HIM: Tigers' A.J. Hinch: His peers consider him 'one of the best managers in the game'
Do you think the players are thinking about the trade deadline?
"I don't know if it gets into the players' heads. I know they're looking forward to getting Carp (Kerry Carpenter) back. Everyone is curious what Sawyer (Gipson-Long) is doing. We just talked about Alex Cobb. There are going to be changes throughout, no matter what. The deadline is the deadline. It's the most popular topic nowadays than ever before. There are times where it was a hush, hush topic and nobody talked about it, and now, it's on everybody's feed. It's the first thing your family, your friends, people around the game, (media). Baseball has done a good job of making it a huge, huge day, even if it's controversial amongst fanbases. I try to keep that noise out of the clubhouse, but we're going to carry around these iPhones, and they have the ability to check every 30 seconds, if they want. I can pretend like the topic doesn't exist, but it doesn't help us beat Toronto. I'm trying to get these guys focused on that. If it affects them, then we'll try to navigate it the best we can. Hopefully, it doesn't."
Does being buyers instead of sellers at the trade deadline change the mindset in the clubhouse?
"I think what's more interesting about this team is we're in a completely different situation this year than we were last year. It's been a rough week. We're still being chased. We still have a lot to pump our chest out about with how we've gotten to this point and what we've done. But as I've said before, it doesn't matter until we get to the end of the schedule — what we've done or haven't done. We've got to play the whole schedule. When Ernie Clement homers, everybody collectively was like, 'Oh man.' That doesn't mean the game is over. That doesn't mean the series is over. I've got to try to get everybody to believe that and do the little things that it's going to take to beat the Blue Jays and be the team that we've been over the large majority of the season. That's the fun part. You got to love it in the bad times too. You're not just allowed to love sports when you're going well and hate sports when you're going poorly. That's not how it works."
JULY 31: Big splash coming? Tigers expected to take conservative approach at trade deadline
Do you feel like the players are pressing right now?
"Of course. I think it's natural to want it more today based on how the last couple weeks have gone. This is a young group that's trying hard. We can all be naive. I can lie to you and say, 'No, they're fine.' Of course, we're pressing. That's what you do when things don't go well. Anybody that doesn't press a little bit harder, dig a little bit deeper or be a little bit more concerned is probably faking it. Sports matter. It matters every day. I think it's a healthy thing to go through and have to push and persevere and maybe focus a little bit more because there's going to be another one of these in these guys' careers, if they stick around long enough. The ebbs and flows of the season are real, and we've got to own it and continue to play to win."
What's the difference between a healthy urgency and pressing too much?
"You don't want it to suffocate you. You don't want it to overwhelm you to the point of being a shadow of yourself or not being able to function. I certainly don't see that. But I know how badly guys want to be the guy. I'm concerned more about the process. When you're chasing the result, you're going to get distracted along the way. The process is what gets you there — swinging at good pitches, being in a good position, being mentally aware of how many outs there are, all the little things that teams do. If I describe Toronto right now, they're doing all the little things really well. George Springer works the ball up the middle to move a guy to third base as a middle of the order bat. It's a little thing, and they got themselves in a better position to do well. Those are things that lead to wins. If we chase winning: I want to win. I want to win. I want to win. What does it take to get there to wins? It's a lot of little things that make it difficult on your opponent. And it sounds like the team that we had for 100 games. Do we not have that team anymore? Of course, we do. But we got to go into the competition, and we got to go prove it, and we have to prove it the next night and the next night — for 60 more games. Try not to ride the roller coaster too much but respect the fact that, right now, we're not in a great place doing the things that have led to so many of our wins."
IN PITTSBURGH: Struggling Tigers need to 'get our swagger back' amid rough stretch, mental lapses
How is managing during a rough stretch different from when things are going well?
"It's hard enough to press the reset button after a good time, where you win a series. We've lost a little bit of our identity of getting out of the gate hot in the game. We haven't been able to do that. The morale is good, but it's tough on these guys. This has been a rough, tough couple of weeks, and we're getting tested at the highest mark. I think they're both equally hard to manage through, when you're talking about 162 games, but the lows are definitely harder. The highs are always great. You're just trying to get to the next game and carry a little bit of your mojo into the next game. This one, we're trying to keep our chins up, keep our chest out and realize we're still a first place team. We're one good win away from potentially taking off again."
Is there a specific reason for this stretch beyond the ups and downs of a long season?
"If we could explain it, we would snap our fingers and fix it. I think that's what is hard about sports: Everybody wants to know why. We've got to go get ready for a game. We're trying to address some of the things that are bleeding into our style of play — uncharacteristic mistakes, two-strike middle-middle (pitches), which are getting beat. You can write a laundry list of things when teams aren't going well about what's going wrong. Baseball is going to push back a little bit and make you play the next day and the next day and the next day. The Blue Jays or any other team that we play aren't going to feel sorry for us. We've got to play better."
How can you tell morale is still good even when the results are bad?
"We're not pouting and sulking. There's a ton of frustration. There's a ton of togetherness. There's a ton of guys trying to find solutions. It's not a matter of effort, trying, working, drills or staying together. Right now, execution is hard to find for nine innings. It feels pretty good for a minute, but it's going to take 27 outs to get to the finish line."
Contact Evan Petzold at [e-mail] or follow him @EvanPetzold.
Listen to our weekly Tigers show "Days of Roar" every Monday afternoon on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. And catch all of our podcasts and daily voice briefing at freep.com/podcasts.
Order your copy of 'Roar of 125: The Epic History of the Tigers!' by the Free Press at Tigers125.PictorialBook.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: A.J. Hinch breaks down Detroit Tigers' struggles