ST. LOUIS — The ball landed in Big Mac Land.
At that moment, it felt like the Detroit Tigers would finally lose.
Nolan Arenado, a seven-time All-Star and five-time Silver Slugger, had unloaded on right-hander Spencer Turnbull’s fastball with two strikes and two outs in the fifth inning. The homer landed in the third deck in left field at Busch Stadium.
“Really big gut punch, but we didn’t concede anything,” Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said. “We kept playing, chipped away and won the game.”
The Tigers, relying on a scrappy brand of baseball, mounted another comeback and won, 6-5, in 10 innings Saturday against the St. Louis Cardinals. The victory extended the Tigers’ winning streak to five games.
“We’re never out of it,” Spencer Torkelson said. “We feel that way really strongly. We believe in one another, and we believe in passing the baton, having good at-bats, grinding the pitcher out and making them pay for the mistakes. We’re doing really well right now, and it feels really good.”
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In the 10th, Akil Baddoo hit a go-ahead ground-rule double off right-handed reliever Giovanny Gallegos.
The Tigers (15-17) then took down the Cardinals in the bottom of the inning as Torkelson, the 23-year-old first baseman, fielded a hard-hit grounder from Alec Burleson and completed a gutsy play to eliminate the extra-inning free runner trying to advance to third base.
“You take a chance and it works out, it feels pretty good,” Hinch said.
Right-handed reliever José Cisnero, following Torkelson’s throw to third base, retired the next two batters.
“Every time there’s a runner on second and no outs,” Torkelson said, “I always look at the third baseman and tell him, ‘If it’s hit hard enough, I’m coming to you.’ It finally came to fruition.”
Mess with the ‘Bull
Back in the fifth inning, Turnbull came one strike away from limiting the Cardinals to three runs, but Arenado spoiled his seventh start of the season with a two-run homer for a 5-3 Cardinals advantage.
The Tigers scored two runs across the sixth and seventh innings, both on singles from Torkelson, for a 5-5 tie.
Torkelson, the 2020 No. 1 overall pick, hit right-hander Adam Wainwright’s first-pitch changeup for an RBI single in the sixth, then hit righty reliever Chris Stratton’s first-pitch curveball for an RBI single in the seventh.
“He’s an unbelievable pitcher,” Torkelson said of Wainwright. “His velocity wasn’t really there, so he was nibbling and getting the corners. I think we did a really good job of waiting him out and getting our mistakes later. I’m happy with the way we trusted our approach against him.”
In the ninth inning, Andy Ibáñez ripped a leadoff single against Gallegos. Riley Greene dumped a full-count fastball into the right-field corner. The hit went for a double — his second two-bagger in as many games — to put two runners in scoring position.
But Javier Báez popped out, and Jonathan Schoop popped into a double play in foul territory. Ibáñez tried to score from third on Schoop’s fly — third-base coach Gary Jones sent him — and was thrown out by right fielder Lars Nootbaar at the plate to end the top of the ninth.
It wasn’t a close play.
“I want him to go, 100 out of 100 times,” Hinch said. “It’s a running catch. A lot of things can happen at the end of that catch. It’s really hard to come up with a two-out base hit. I don’t mind letting the players play and letting the moment happen. I love the send. I love the go.”
Four relievers covered the final 4⅓ innings before extra innings: left-hander Chasen Shreve (1⅓ innings), right-hander Will Vest (1⅔ innings), lefty Tyler Holton (⅔ innings) and Cisnero (⅔ innings).
Fellow relievers Alex Lange, Jason Foley and Mason Englert were unavailable to pitch for workload reasons.
“We’re going to rely on every guy down there in different ways,” Hinch said. “Sometimes, it’s going to be normal roles and easy to see when I’m going to use them. Other days, it’s going to be like this where you got some guys pitching in leverage that need to do their part if you want to win the game.”
Bouncing back
Facing Turnbull, the Cardinals scored their first three runs in the second inning. The inning started with a five-pitch walk from Paul DeJong and continued with a single from Brendan Donovan.
Dylan Carlson, a left-handed hitter, then put the Cardinals in front, 3-0, with a three-run home run off Turnbull’s down-and-in slider. After Andrew Knizer’s ensuing single, Tigers pitching coach Chris Fetter took a mound visit.
Then, Turnbull retired 11 of the next 12 batters.
“I had a rough second inning, and I got myself in trouble with the walk and getting behind guys, but I felt like I was able to make a pretty good adjustment for the last three (innings),” Turnbull said. “The one pitch to Nolan was heartbreaking there for a second, but the boys rallied back, and we were able to pull out a win. That’s all that matters.”
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In the fourth inning, Riley Greene robbed Knizer of extra bases when he crashed into the center-field wall while completing a leaping catch. The impressive catch concluded the fourth.
Turnbull, who missed the entire 2022 season while recovering from Tommy John surgery, allowed five runs on seven hits and one walk with six strikeouts. All five of those runs were scored on homers.
The 30-year-old threw 63 of 92 pitches and generated 14 whiffs. He induced whiffs on eight four-seam fastballs, one sinker, four sliders and one curveball, and his four-seamer averaged 93.3 mph.
He has a 7.26 ERA this season.
“I was really frustrated in that second inning,” Turnbull said. “That was completely on me for getting behind and not executing pitches. I was like, ‘I’m not doing that anymore. I’m done with this crap.’ I don’t know why I couldn’t just do that before and save us the three runs in the second inning, but I guess that’s part of it.”
Waiting on Waino
The Tigers’ offense was slow to start against Wainwright. The 41-year-old returned from the injured list — sidelined with a groin strain since the end of spring training — for his first start of the season.
He trademark curveball generated seven of his eight whiffs.
He dominated the Tigers until the fifth inning.
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In the fifth, Baddoo provided a leadoff single and proceeded to steal second. He advanced to third on Matt Vierling’s flyout and scored the Tigers’ first run on Eric Haase’s bloop single to shallow left-center field.
The combination of Zack Short and Zach McKinstry, plus poor defense from the Cardinals, provided the second run, cutting the deficit to 3-2, as Short doubled and McKinstry hit a sacrifice fly.
The ball from McKinstry ended up in right field. Second baseman Brendan Donovan and right fielder Nootbaar tracked down the pop up, with Donovan catching the ball. On the catch, however, the two players collided, and the collision allowed Haase to score from third base on a delayed throw to home plate.
The Tigers tied the game, 3-3, on Greene’s line-drive single to left field to conclude the three-run fifth inning. Wainwright allowed four runs on eight hits, zero walks and five strikeouts in five-plus innings.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @EvanPetzold.