DETROIT — This one was there for the taking. And then, in the span of one inning, it was gone.
From the Detroit Tigers’ point of view, Monday night’s 5-4 loss to the Boston Red Sox wasn’t about being overmatched — it was about letting control slip at the worst possible moment.
Detroit carried a 2-0 lead into the seventh inning, playing clean enough baseball and taking advantage of Boston mistakes to stay in command. The game had the feel of a grind-it-out win — exactly the kind of game this club needs while dealing with a taxed rotation and inconsistent offense.
Then the seventh happened.
A leadoff walk opened the door. A single by Andruw Monasterio pushed it wider. And just like that, the inning flipped from manageable to dangerous. With two on, Jarren Duran delivered the swing that changed everything — a three-run homer that turned a Tigers lead into a deficit in seconds.
From there, it unraveled.
Boston strung together more quality at-bats, piling on with additional hits and extending the damage to a five-run inning. What had been a controlled 2-0 game suddenly became a 5-2 hole, and the energy inside Comerica Park shifted instantly.
To Detroit’s credit, they didn’t fold.
The Tigers chipped away late, pushing across two runs to make it a one-run game. They brought the tying run into play and forced Boston to earn the final outs. But the early missed opportunities and that one disastrous inning proved too much to overcome.
That’s the frustration.
Detroit did enough to win this game for six innings. They controlled tempo, capitalized on mistakes, and kept Boston’s struggling offense quiet. But baseball doesn’t reward “almost” — not when one inning gets away from you.
And that’s the lesson from this one.
A single inning. A couple of free passes. One big swing. That’s all it took to turn a win into a loss.
For a Tigers team trying to find consistency, this one stings — not because they were outplayed, but because they let it slip through their hands.
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