Miguel Cabrera’s march to 500 home runs continued Tuesday night at Comerica Park, where his 498th career homer was an opposite-field drive into the right-field tunnel off Red Sox right-hander Garrett Richards.
Cabrera’s 11th home run of the season — also his third in five games this homestand — highlighted the Tigers’ 4-2 win. His past seven homers have been opposite-field shots as he continues to work on his swing of old.
The buzz around Cabrera’s milestone chase has been attracting fans ever since his two-homer game last Thursday to begin the homestand. Fans began to applaud as soon as he stepped out of the dugout to take his warmup swings on deck before the bottom of the second inning began.
Cabrera took a first-pitch fastball high from Richards before getting a 95 mph heater high in the strike zone. Cabrera laced it towards right field at 103.6 mph, to cut the Tigers’ deficit to 2-1.
While the Tigers’ dugout went wild and Tigers personnel changed the numbers on his home run and hit trackers in left field, his good friend and ex-teammate J.D. Martinez sat and smiled at the top of the Red Sox dugout. He saw more than a few of those during his four-year Tiger tenure.
Cabrera added a ground-ball single through the left side of the infield his next time up for his 2,944th career hit, pushing him past Hall of Famer Frank Robinson for 36th on the AL/NL all-time list, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
