Minneapolis — Eric Haase, as you might expect, spent a restless night Tuesday going over and over the crazy play that gave the Twins a 5-4 walk-off win. He watched it from every available camera angle, even the wide view from over home plate. He thought through his options, what he might’ve done differently.
He was still processing it Wednesday afternoon.
“Once I saw the video, saw the high home angle, I got an idea of what was going on and I got to decompress a little bit and think through the thought process,” Haase said. “The physical error, throwing the ball into left field, that hurts a lot. There’s no two ways about it.”
He and manager AJ Hinch met and talked it over.
“Once we did that it was a lot better,” Haase said. “There were only two options on that play and unfortunately I got caught in the middle of it. But even if I made the wrong decision and handled the ball correctly, you at least have one out on the bases.
“You’re not out of the woods, they still have runners at second and third. But you live to draw another breath. You can play the what-if game all day. It was a throw that needed to be made and it wasn’t.”
Truth be told, only one player on the field, from both teams, played it correctly. And that was Tigers shortstop Javy Báez.
“He was the one player asking for the ball and who knew where the ball was supposed to go,” Hinch said. “He’s completely out of the play, being the double-cut from the outfield when (Jonathan) Schoop threw home. Then he’s completely in the play begging for the ball at second base.”
The miscues started when Tigers right fielder Robbie Grossman took a flat route on Miguel Sano’s liner and the ball sailed off his glove. Schoop’s relay throw home went right into the ground forcing Haase to come up the line and make a sliding play just to smother the ball.
All three Twins runners messed the play up, too. Trevor Larnach got tied up between second and third and ended up peeling back to third. Geo Urshela bolted for third base, even though Larnach was there, when he saw Sano inexplicably barreling toward second base.
When Haase secured the ball and looked up, he saw chaos.
“The base running on their part was something you can’t prepare for,” Haase said. “You are expecting to make a play at the plate on the winning run and they stopped the tying run at third and I’m falling on my butt trying to smother the ball.
“It went from being a well-executed rundown to absolute chaos.”
If Haase could do it over, he would have run it toward second base and force Urshela to go toward third base. When he secured Schoop’s throw, he saw Larnach going back to third and Urshela also going to third. At that point, Báez was sprinting to second but by then, Haase had already vacated the plate toward third base.
“Right when I’m about to give the ball up, (Urshela) breaks to second,” Haase said. “I vacate home and try to pitch it and throw it into left field. The correct play, if I would have left home would’ve been to go to second and get the runner going back to third base.”
Or, if he had the benefit of several after-the-fact reviews like we all have, he might have just held the ball and killed the play. The Tigers would still be leading 4-3 with one out.
“At the same time, there is a double-play waiting for us on the field somewhere,” he said. “Just from where I thought the runner should’ve been compared to where they were when I actually got the ball, it was nowhere at all what I was envisioning.”
But in the moment, he saw two runners at third base and his instinct was to run to third and get at least one out. As he was on his way, Urshela broke back to second. Instead of trying to stop and redirect his throw to second, he stayed on plan and threw it to third baseman Jeimer Candelario, then headed back to the plate for the possible rundown.
“The play is to keep the pitcher (Gregory Soto) out of rundowns at any cost,” Haase said. “So give it up to Candy and I stay at the plate…It’s not a mental mistake. You’re going to make mistakes playing hard. But it doesn’t make it any easier to swallow at the of the day.”
Hinch wanted to Haase to take him through his thought process.
“You want to make sure we review a plan that we can learn from,” Hinch said. “That play, you’re never going to practice it. It’s an instinctive play. During the game when you are ad-libbing as the play is going on, I want to make sure he knows what his decision points are. I like him talk through what he was thinking.
“He made a mistake, but that isn’t the end of it. We have to make sure he’s knows there’s other decisions he could make along the way. A lot went wrong on that play. It’s not all Eric Haase’s fault.”
chris.mccosky@detroitnews.com
Twitter: @cmccosky
Tigers at Twins
When: 1:10 p.m., Thursday, Target Field, Minneapolis
TV/radio: BSD/97.1
Scouting report
LHP Tarik Skubal (1-1, 2.30), Tigers: He’s been a beast. He hasn’t allowed an earned run or walk in his last two starts, covering 11.2 innings. He’s struck out 13 and opponents are hitting .205 with just one extra base hit. The Twins have hit 10 homers off Skubal in his previous six outings against them, the most by any team against him.
RHP Bailey Ober (1-1, 2.81), Twins: He’s only allowed one earned run over his last two starts, covering 11 innings. He’s not overpowering by any means (91 mph fastball), but he has precise command and a lethal slider. Hitters are 2 for 21 with six strikeouts against it this season.