Mitch Albom: Detroit Tigers' long-awaited home playoff craving finally satisfied without hesitation

Here's a rewritten version of your passage:

Now that’s how you end a drought. The city buzzed with excitement. The sun sparkled like a diamond, and the air was cool and crisp with anticipation. It was a fall day that felt like spring, and the scene outside Comerica Park was electric—wild yet serious, reminiscent of Opening Day, but with real stakes.

And significant stakes at that. After ten barren Octobers, playoff baseball had finally returned to Detroit, pulsating with tense energy. Four road games had come and gone, and now, at long last, a home game awaited, with the ALDS all tied up. Given their youth, one might expect the Detroit Tigers to be overwhelmed by the weight of hometown expectations.

But this surprising team joyfully defies the odds, from unpredictable lineups to chaotic pitching changes. Nothing is certain.

Everything is exhilarating.

Tiger fans erupted as the eighth inning closed, sealing a win against the Cleveland Guardians in Game 3 of the ALDS on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024.

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“We’re treating baseball like a game,” catcher Jake Rogers remarked.

It’s hard to explain just how effective that mindset is.

So it should come as no surprise that these seemingly carefree Tigers are now just one win away from contending for the American League pennant. They used six pitchers to clinch Wednesday’s Game 3, Riley Greene drove in the first run in the first inning, Rogers, batting ninth, doubled and scored the second run, and the poetically named Beau Brieske struck out three of his six consecutive outs, leaving to thunderous applause.

And then there was the sixth inning. With Detroit clinging to a 2-0 lead over Cleveland, Spencer Torkelson stepped up to the plate, hoping to break his own personal drought. After going hitless in his previous 14 postseason at-bats, Torkelson wasn’t enjoying himself as much as his teammates. He undoubtedly heard the murmurs. As the No. 1 pick in the 2020 draft, his career has been a rollercoaster of highs and lows—rising to the big leagues, being sent back down, earning a spot again with a stellar sophomore season, then slumping and facing another demotion.

Now, in an October no one expected, here stood Torkelson, at the plate where he longed to be but not in the position he wanted. No hits, seven strikeouts, a .000 batting average across four games.

But …

“In October,” A.J. Hinch said, “you’re just one swing away from a completely different emotional reaction as a player.”

And here came the pitch …

“Just grind, stay in the fight.”

Detroit Tigers first baseman Spencer Torkelson (20) delivered an RBI double in the sixth inning, boosting the score to 3-0 in their victory over the Cleveland Guardians in Game 3 of the American League Division Series at Comerica Park on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024.

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Torkelson connected with an inside pitch from reliever Eli Morgan, sending the ball soaring to deep left field—a sound as definitive as a judge’s gavel. It reached the wall, allowing Colt Keith to score, while Torkelson raced to second base. The RBI pushed the score to 3-0, a lead that felt monumental given the Tigers’ pitching performance.

The largest postseason crowd in Comerica Park history erupted in celebration.

“What were you thinking during that at-bat?” Torkelson was asked after the win.

“Just grind, stay in the fight,” he replied. “Just keep going. That’s really it. In the playoffs, you don’t get caught up in the numbers; you just try to win baseball games. And we’re doing that, so I was pretty happy.”

He added, “It felt good to come through today.”

And that’s what Hinch was referring to—one at-bat, one contribution, and suddenly everything changes for you, just as the Tigers, once thought to be also-rans this season, now view themselves differently. They are free of doubt. Free of hesitation.

“No one really thought we’d be here,” Matt Vierling said, echoing a sentiment he had expressed before. “We kind of played with house money toward the end of the season. No one expected us to make it to October… We feel like we’ve got no pressure, so we can just keep going.”