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How A.J. Hinch led Detroit Tigers to 2025 postseason with 'play the whole schedule' mantra
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- How A.J. Hinch led Detroit Tigers to 2025 postseason with 'play the whole schedule' mantra
BOSTON — Detroit Tigers manager A.J. Hinch has sounded like a broken record.
That's not a bad thing.
Over the past week, the 12-year MLB manager has repeated the same mantra in different ways — but it's the exact message he has given his players for the entire 2025 season:
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"The only thing we can do is play the schedule."
"Every team has the opportunity to play their schedule."
"We have nothing to do but get ready for tomorrow's game because we've got to play the schedule."
A.J. Hinch, manager of the Detroit Tigers, right, shares a laugh with Jack Flaherty after their 2-1 win over the Boston Red Sox at Fenway Park in Boston on Saturday, Sept. 27, 2025.
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After 161 of 162 games, the Tigers punched their ticket to the 2025 postseason with a 2-1 win over the Boston Red Sox on Saturday, Sept. 27, at Fenway Park. The two runs scored on Jahmai Jones ' single in the fifth inning.
It's the Tigers' second straight playoff berth.
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"We have to play the whole schedule regardless — good times, bad times, good stretches, bad stretches," said Hinch, whose Tigers had lost 12 of 14 games before clinching at least an American League wild-card berth. "We've got to play a full season to get where we want to get to."
This is Hinch's fifth season as manager and Scott Harris ' third season as president of baseball operations. The franchise has qualified for the postseason in 18 of its 125 seasons, winning the World Series in 1935, 1945, 1968 and 1984.
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Harris is confident in the Tigers in 2025.
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"History," Harris said. "There are countless examples of teams that maybe didn't play their best baseball at the end of the regular season, got a fresh start, lined up their pitching and got really hot in October. We're going to do everything that we can to be one of those groups."
Left-hander Tarik Skubal — the 2024 AL Cy Young winner and 2025 AL Cy Young favorite — is scheduled to start Game 1 of the wild-card series. He registered a 2.21 ERA with 33 walks and 241 strikeouts across 195⅓ innings in 31 starts.
In the 2024 postseason, the Tigers swept the Houston Astros in two games in the wild-card series, then lost to the Cleveland Guardians in the best-of-five ALDS, capped by Lane Thomas hitting a grand slam off Skubal in the fifth inning of Game 5 .
"This is why you play the game," Skubal said. "This is what you prepare for. This is why you do all this stuff in the offseason that you do. It's why you spend the last seven months taking care of yourself daily, and you don't let your routine change. You stay grinding and try to get a little bit better each and every day. At the end of the day, that's all I can really control. I'll do my best to win a game."
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To advance, the Tigers had to play their full schedule — just like Hinch has preached. There were many ups and a few downs along the way, including just eight wins in their previous 29 games that nearly led to a complete collapse.
The Tigers posted a 59-34 record in their first 93 games.
Since then, the Tigers have gone 28-40.
THE GAME: Tigers clinch spot in 2025 MLB playoffs with 2-1 win vs. Red Sox
"Experience will tell me that so many things can happen," Hinch said. "The minute that you don't respect the entire schedule, which we have respected the whole schedule, but if you don't, the sport is not very kind to you."
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Hinch has conveyed several messages — win today's game, win one series at a time and play the full 162-game schedule — to his players throughout 2025, spanning six months in the regular season.
Now, the Tigers are celebrating another trip to the postseason.
"For the majority of this season, we were asked about postseason, we were asked about October, we were asked about the path to get there, but we hadn't earned it yet," Hinch said. "It's hard to close out seasons, but this team stayed together. The most important thing that happened in the span of the games that we struggled in is we never turned our back on one another."
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold .
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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Manager A.J. Hinch mantra pushes Detroit Tigers to 2025 MLB playoffs
