DETROIT -- The Indians and Comerica Park have become a bad pairing for the Tigers. However, left-handed pitchers tend to be a bad matchup for Cleveland. On Sunday, with the Tigers needing some sort of spark to avoid their first four-game sweep to the Indians in Detroit, Drew Smyly made sure the latter trend won out.It wasn't the no-hitter some might have hoped to see after Smyly confounded Cleveland hitters for his first four-plus innings. Nor was it the runaway win the Tigers had a chance to build with middle-inning scoring chances. A 5-1 win, however, was good enough to send the Tigers on the road with a 5 1/2-game lead in the American League Central. 
It wasn't the series they wanted out of the break, but it wasn't the historic sweep they feared, either.The Indians have swept series in Detroit, most recently a three-game set in August 2008, but they've never taken four games from the Tigers in the Motor City. An April postponement turned what was originally a three-game weekend series into four games in a 48-hour stretch out of the All-Star break.The Tigers lost a seventh-inning lead in Friday's opener and never found a moment to recover during Saturday's day-night doubleheader. Smyly's stingy pitching gave them a chance.Smyly has battled inconsistency this season, but most of his problems have come courtesy of right-handed hitters, who were hitting .315 with a .909 OPS against him entering Sunday's game. Left-handers, by contrast, were batting .157 with a .436 OPS. Though Cleveland tried to put up as much opposition as it could from the right side, including former Tiger Ryan Raburn batting fifth, the Indians still had Jason Kipnis, Michael Brantley and David Murphy in their lineup.Smyly (6-8) not only handled the lefties with relative ease, his breaking ball gave him an out pitch against the righties. The resulting performance saw the Indians go hitless until Yan Gomes doubled to the out-of-town scoreboard in right-center field with two outs in the fifth. Cleveland's lone baserunners until then were walks to Brantley and switch-hitting Carlos Santana, both of whom Smyly had in two-strike counts.Detroit never trailed, with Austin Jackson hitting a leadoff double and scoring on Ian Kinsler's single in the first. Raburn's throw home allowed Kinsler to take second, giving him a chance to come around on back-to-back fly balls from Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez.Once Torii Hunter feasted on a hanging breaking ball from Indians starter Josh Tomlin (5-7) in the fourth, the Tigers had a four-run lead. Though Gomes struck again to put Cleveland on the scoreboard, hammering a solo homer to left with two outs in the seventh, Detroit's beleaguered bullpen took care of the final six outs, helped in no small part by Nick Castellanos' insurance RBI double with two outs in the eighth.Smyly delivered seven innings of one-run ball for the second time in his career, allowing four hits while striking out six.Jason Beck / MLB.com
It wasn't the series they wanted out of the break, but it wasn't the historic sweep they feared, either.The Indians have swept series in Detroit, most recently a three-game set in August 2008, but they've never taken four games from the Tigers in the Motor City. An April postponement turned what was originally a three-game weekend series into four games in a 48-hour stretch out of the All-Star break.The Tigers lost a seventh-inning lead in Friday's opener and never found a moment to recover during Saturday's day-night doubleheader. Smyly's stingy pitching gave them a chance.Smyly has battled inconsistency this season, but most of his problems have come courtesy of right-handed hitters, who were hitting .315 with a .909 OPS against him entering Sunday's game. Left-handers, by contrast, were batting .157 with a .436 OPS. Though Cleveland tried to put up as much opposition as it could from the right side, including former Tiger Ryan Raburn batting fifth, the Indians still had Jason Kipnis, Michael Brantley and David Murphy in their lineup.Smyly (6-8) not only handled the lefties with relative ease, his breaking ball gave him an out pitch against the righties. The resulting performance saw the Indians go hitless until Yan Gomes doubled to the out-of-town scoreboard in right-center field with two outs in the fifth. Cleveland's lone baserunners until then were walks to Brantley and switch-hitting Carlos Santana, both of whom Smyly had in two-strike counts.Detroit never trailed, with Austin Jackson hitting a leadoff double and scoring on Ian Kinsler's single in the first. Raburn's throw home allowed Kinsler to take second, giving him a chance to come around on back-to-back fly balls from Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez.Once Torii Hunter feasted on a hanging breaking ball from Indians starter Josh Tomlin (5-7) in the fourth, the Tigers had a four-run lead. Though Gomes struck again to put Cleveland on the scoreboard, hammering a solo homer to left with two outs in the seventh, Detroit's beleaguered bullpen took care of the final six outs, helped in no small part by Nick Castellanos' insurance RBI double with two outs in the eighth.Smyly delivered seven innings of one-run ball for the second time in his career, allowing four hits while striking out six.Jason Beck / MLB.com
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