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    • Tigers fans welcome the return of playoff baseball
    Tennessee

    Tigers fans welcome the return of playoff baseball

    Eira Gwyneth Posted on

    Detroit – Victoria Hayes didn’t think she would be here. Neither does Matt Lewandowski. Carol Heeringa thought she would be in Ireland.

    The place they never thought they would be was at a baseball game at Comerica Park in October.

    Playoff baseball in Detroit, who knew?

    “This is the best surprise of the year,” said Heeringa, 70, a Whitaker resident who was hoping to bring some luck to the Irish on Wednesday as the Tigers tied the Tigers 1-1 in Game 3 of an American League Division Series Cleveland Guardians played -1.

    Plans were thwarted. Deadlines were not met. Work had to wait another day. When the Tigers’ Express runs through the city center, all other trains must leave the tracks.

    Lewandowski, 73, of Port Huron, is a longtime fan who once shared his schedule for the baseball postseason in Detroit. But this year is special, he said. This year was completely unexpected.

    Still, he and his wife Jeannie harbored hope against hope.

    “I never gave up on her,” Jeannie said. “That’s life as a Tigers fan.”

    It’s been a while since the Tigers making the playoffs didn’t shock the public. A team led by slugger Miguel Cabrera and pitcher Justin Verlander made the playoffs four years in a row. But that ended in 2014.

    The team has navigated a barren baseball landscape over the past decade. Fans learned to deal with disappointment and hoped against all odds that the team would eventually turn things around.

    “The long absence from October makes this one all the more palatable,” said Hayes, who is in his 50s and lives on the west side of Detroit.

    “That’s OK,” she said of the long wait. “It makes it sweeter in the end. Never count Detroit out. Never give up.”

    Heeringa traveled to the Emerald Isle as a birthday present from her son. But she told him it was too generous.

    Then the Tigers, who she is passionate about, started winning and didn’t stop. When it looked like the team might make the playoffs, she knew where she wanted to be.

    “This is better,” she said of Comerica compared to Ireland. “Ireland looks like Michigan anyway.”

    Heeringa has a long list of the Tigers’ shining moments she’s witnessed – pitcher Denny McLain’s historic 31st Victory, the 1968 World Series won by Detroit. Even in the last few lean years, she never gave up her desire to be successful again soon.

    “I believe in her no matter what,” she said. “It’s in the heart.”

    Without the baseball game, Hayes said she would probably be mowing her lawn today. Instead, she spent the whole night making her magical tiger socks.

    The orange yarn is decorated with a replica tiger, an old English D, beads (“for the ladies”) and a key (to unlock the door for that great run).

    “I’m having fun,” Hayes said. “You gave them a 2% chance of making the playoffs. That’s why it’s so much fun.”

    Jeannie Lewandowski is another birthday girl. Without the game, she and her husband likely would have spent the day playing the slot machines at FireKeepers Casino in Battle Creek.

    The gambling plans were apparently scrapped when their favorite team started playing extra games this year. Jeannie loves the idea of ​​the Tigers making the playoffs, and the ten-year wait has made it even better.

    She described it as a tumultuous year, with the team looking good in April, reeling for a few months and then embarking on a magical carpet ride in August.

    “It was a little scary,” Jeannie Lewandowski said. “You need pitching to win, but somehow they did it without it.”

    The fresh air on Wednesday reminded Pat Fitzgerald of opening day in April. The Tigers’ first home game of the season is usually her favorite day, but the team’s first home game of the playoffs is hard to beat, she admitted.

    Did she do anything different in a home playoff game than she did in the regular season?

    “Not really, I just hope for the best,” Fitzgerald said.

    Fitzgerald, 63, of Troy, said the Tigers won on opening day, so she tried to remember what she did that day. Since she is superstitious, she planned to repeat the activity on Wednesday to see if it brings the team luck.

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    Eira Gwyneth
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