Ian Kinsler hits 2-run game winning home run

The 5-4 defeat to the Tigers on Monday night was like a kick to the stomach when you’ve already been beaten to the ground.

Ian Kinsler blasted two home runs, including a go-ahead two-run shot in the eighth inning, leading the Detroit Tigers to a 5-4 win over the Seattle Mariners on Monday night at Comerica Park.Kinsler’s two-out game-winner over the left field wall was the first home run allowed by Seattle reliever Mark Lowe (0-1) this season.

With two outs in the eighth inning and a runner on second, Lowe left a 96-mph fastball over the middle of the plate to Ian Kinsler.

While it was a rare power surge for Kinsler, who entered the game with three homers, he has been hitting the ball better. It was his first multi-homer game since September 7, 2011. Whatever they do, weve got to roll with it and hopefully its something we can look at as a positive in here and get going.”. 500 for the first time this season.

Al Alburquerque (1-0) picked up his first decision in 60 outings, pitching a scoreless eighth inning. Simon allowed four runs on six hits and four walks in 5 2/3 innings. With Alfredo Simon and Shane Greene projected starters the next two nights, Detroit might need that kind of run production again in order to win. “The bullpen did their job, too, to hold the other team where they’re at and give us an opportunity”.

“It’s our fault”, he said, referring to Tigers players. Kinsler said he threw it at the ground. “He made a mistake, I got a good pitch and I was lucky enough to put enough to put a good swing on it”.

The Mariners lost for the third time in four games since the All-Star break.

“Once you start talking about that it takes away energy from what we’re trying to do”, Kinsler said. Simon has allowed at least four runs in an AL-high six straight starts, posting a 10.25 ERA while averaging under five innings per outing. McClendon had no regrets about bringing in Lowe to start the eighth. “They had a few tough righties coming up”. It makes things a lot easier. He’s hit seven of them in his last 23 games.

“It was just something I wanted to point out”. Martinez and a one-out walk to Nic Castellanos put Happ in a jam. James McCann added to the problems, ripping a double into the left-field corner to score both runners and make it 3-2. Seattle CF Austin Jackson, a former Tiger, went 2-for-4. But after Jose Iglesias reached on a double against Mark Lowe in the 8th, Kinsler’s second homer of the evening erased Happ’s quality start.

Kinsler hit his fourth homer on a first-pitch swing in the bottom of the first.

The over is a perfect 4-0 in the last four meetings between these two teams and 9-2-1 in the last 12 meetings between the Mariners and Tigers when the game is played in Detroit. Two runs scored, but Morrison only made it to third and Simon got out of the jam without further damage.

The Mariners did get even in the fifth when Cano drove a non-sinking splitter over the left-field wall for his ninth homer. The Mariners dropped the rubber match of a three-game set at the New York Yankees on Sunday and haven’t posted back-to-back victories since June 30-July 1.