A rare team meeting sparked a stunning playoff surge

HOUSTON – Want to know the turning point of this season for the Detroit Tigers?

Do you want to know when everything worked out?

How did this team go from trade deadline sellers to playing in the postseason?

It may have started after a rare team meeting — after the trade deadline, around the time they played the New York Yankees in the MLB's Little League Classic on Aug. 18.

Tigers manager AJ Hinch brought his team together and several big-name players were gone, including Mark Canha, Andrew Chafin and Carson Kelly.

But some were in the process of returning, including Riley Greene, Kerry Carpenter and Parker Meadows.

In a way it was a new team.

And it was at a turning point.

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“Usually when team meetings happen, things aren't going well and you're like, well, what's this going to be? What will it be like?” pitcher Beau Brieske said Wednesday. “And it wasn’t us who got beaten up. It wasn't anything bad. It was more about asking ourselves and making everyone look in the mirror and ask themselves, “What am I doing to be part of a successful team?” Because at the moment, back then, we were not a winning team. There were a lot of things we could do individually and then as a group to contribute to wins.”

The Tigers could sit around and mope and basically just play out the year.

Or they could be playing for something.

You could try to win.

Hinch laid out the path:

It would require sacrifice.

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It would mean taking on new roles – starters become relievers; Helpers become starters.

This would require dealing with uncertainty and new roles.

“Yes, that was a special moment for us,” Matt Vierling said on Wednesday. “Getting that speech from him was really cool. We worked super hard to get there. So I'm sure he prepared this. But I mean, yeah. We were just excited at that point. We've strived to be a playoff team all year long. Seeing it actually come true was huge for us. So, yeah, I think it was pretty special to see him say that at that point and actually be a playoff team.”

Brieske remembers it the same way.

“I remember just trying to put everything else aside and realize that the goal as a group is to try to win,” Brieske said. “And all the numbers and all the contract stuff, that’s what he said too. He said, “All this will take care of itself if you go out there and play for each other and go out there and win.”… I would imagine it's probably related to a turning point in the season. So, yeah, it was definitely impressive.”

Obviously, we now know what this team decided to do.

The answer came on a magical night at Comerica Park when the Tigers defeated the Chicago White Sox 4-1, clinching a postseason berth and ending the Tigers' playoff drought.

And it culminated when Hinch carried a bottle of champagne into the Tigers' clubhouse.

“Hey, listen, there’s going to be a fire,” Hinch said as he walked through the clubhouse.

Yes, Hinch knows a thing or two about how beer and champagne can sting your eyes.

“This is called punching your ticket for October,” Hinch told his team in a moment captured on video. “Special teams do special things. And we got the opportunity to do something special. We ask a lot of you. “All year long we have asked a lot of you to do something for the man next to you.”

Hinch then referred to the team meeting.

“And when I asked you in the middle of the season, do you remember I asked you what kind of team you wanted to be? I guess they wanted to be a playoff team.”

Hinch popped the cork and sprayed the champagne into the air.

It was like he was showing his boys how to celebrate a win.

His final regular season hour.

And in a way, it all started with that team meeting.

“Yeah, it felt great,” Vierling said Wednesday, recalling the celebration. “It’s kind of the culmination of a year’s worth of hard work to get to this point. Yes, we definitely celebrated accordingly and it was a lot of fun. So, yes, giving a speech like that at that moment was very special for all of us.”

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