On a night he passed Ken Griffey Jr. and tied Ted Williams on the all-time RBI list, Miguel Cabrera's most impressive feat was stealing his first base in two years.
Sneaking his way off second -- all 270 lbs. of him -- with the Tigers leading the Royals 4-3 in the seventh Tuesday, Cabrera bolted for third. It caught all of Kauffman Stadium by surprise, including Royals catcher MJ Melendez whose throw to third baseman Emmanuel Rivera sailed into left field. Cabrera slid in safely, popped up and scampered home, grinning the whole way.
And the Tigers dugout and bullpen went nuts.
"We saw the jump and we were like, 'Holy cow, he's got this easy,'" said Tigers starter Beau Brieske. "And then the speed kicked in."
"Ricky Henderson said, 'When you go, you gotta go. You don’t think, you go!'" Cabrera said between bursts of laughter after the Tigers' 7-5 win. "I always had in my mind, Ricky said that, so you gotta do it. Why would you do something different?"
Asked what made him go this time, Cabrera said, "It was a good opportunity to make something happen -- and thank god I was safe!" Then he laughed some more.
"If you take your eye off anybody," said Royals manager Mike Matheny, "they’re gonna get you."
"That's just a smart baseball play right there," said Brieske, who held the Royals to three runs over six innings.
It was the 40th stolen base of Cabrera's career, just 1,366 shy of Henderson's all-time record.
"Brilliant managing, isn’t it, when you send Miggy," said A.J. Hinch. "He saw something and I guess the athlete in him broke out. But it did ignite some fun in the dugout. We put some pressure on them, they made some mistakes and we ended up opening up a lead that we needed at the end. But I don’t think anybody anticipated Miggy going, including me."
And when Miggy went, what was going through Hinch's mind?
"Holy shit," said Hinch with a laugh. "I was just as surprised as anyone. But he did it, and in true fashion he was laughing the whole way home."
Miguel Cabrera -- the very essence of speed:
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