Tigers show their resiliency in 5-2 victory over Rangers

This is a resilient bunch, Jim Leyland said after injuries robbed his team of outfielders Delmon Young and Magglio Ordonez, and the Detroit manager wasn’t just talking about his banged-up Tigers, who nearly lost designated hitter Victor Martinez on Tuesday night.

Texas center fielder Josh Hamilton’s bat flew into the seats behind the first-base dugout in Comerica Park in Game 3 of the American League championship series, hitting a fan in a Tigers jersey in the back of the head in the sixth inning.

So what did the guy do? He iced his head with a cold, plastic bottle of beer and finished out the game.

That’s the kind of spirit and resolve they have in the Motor City, one that was embodied Tuesday night by the Tigers, who delivered a jaw-cracking counter-punch to the Rangers in a 5-2 victory that pulled them to within 2-1 in the best-of-seven series.

Doug Fister, who learned a thing or two about toughness from his father, Larry, who spent 13 years as a policeman and 20 years as a fireman in Merced, Calif., threw 7 1/3 superb innings, allowing two runs and seven hits and leaving to a rousing standing ovation.

Martinez, Jhonny Peralta and Miguel Cabrera smacked solo home runs, the latter a towering 398-foot bomb to left to lead off the seventh, and leadoff batter Austin Jackson, who entered with a .120 (3 for 25) post-season average and 14 strikeouts, provided a spark with three singles, a run and a run batted in.

Set-up man Joaquin Benoit got the final two outs of the eighth, and closer Jose Valverde threw a scoreless ninth, as Detroit improved to 81-0 this season when leading after seven innings.

Capping the effort were two spirited defensive plays in the top of the ninth, Cabrera making a diving stop on Adrian Beltre’s grounder down the line and flipping to first for the out and right fielder Don Kelly leaping into the corner to catch Mike Napoli’s long drive.

Instead of being down, 3-0, and on the verge of certain elimination, the Tigers can even the series Wednesday afternoon when right-hander Rick Porcello opposes Texas left-hander Matt Harrison.

The situation was looking pretty grim earlier Tuesday night. A mere seven pitches into the game, the Rangers scored one run and had runners on first and second with no outs, not the kind of start Fister and the Tigers envisioned.

Ian Kinsler smacked Fister’s first pitch of to left for a single, and Elvis Andrus executed a perfect hit-and-run, stroking a grounder through the vacated second-base hole to move Kinsler to third.

Hamilton flared a run-scoring single to left-center, and the Tigers appeared to be in big trouble only moments after Aretha Franklin had finished her stirring rendition of the national anthem.

But Fister got Michael Young to ground into a 6-4-3 double play and struck out Beltre to end the inning, and the 6-foot-8 right-hander blanked the Rangers on three hits through the next six innings to give Detroit a chance.

The Tigers tied it in the fourth when Martinez led off with a homer to right, a pitch Martinez swung so hard at he hurt a rib-cage muscle, forcing him to injury slow his home-run trot to a crawl.

Martinez went immediately to the clubhouse to be checked by the medical staff but remained in the game, a relief for a team that was without Young, who was scratched because of a rib-cage strain, and Ordonez, who is out for the series because of a broken ankle.

The top of the order then sparked a two-out rally in the fifth. Jackson singled to right-center and took third on Ramon Santiago’s single to center.

Up stepped Cabrera, by far Detroit’s most dangerous hitter, and out to the on-deck box came the hobbling Martinez. The Rangers could have intentionally walked or pitched around Cabrera and taken their chances with Martinez, but Texas Manager Ron Washington didn’t get this far by backing down.

Texas starter Colby Lewis went right after Cabrera, jumping ahead of him with two strikes, but Cabrera reached for an outside fastball and poked it into the right-field corner for a run-scoring double and a 2-1 lead. The Tigers were two for 21 with runners in scoring position in the ALCS before Cabrera’s hit.

Martinez walked, and Kelly hit a check-swing grounder to third to end the inning, but the Tigers tacked on two more runs in the sixth, an inning Peralta opened with a homer to left.

Andy Dirks singled with two outs, stole second and scored on Jackson’s single to center to give Detroit a 4-1 lead. Cabrera’s homer in the seventh made it 5-1. Yorvit Torrealba doubled and scored on a ground out in the eighth for Texas.