The Detroit Tigers were 56-63 when Kerry Carpenter returned on Aug. 13 from a back injury that sidelined him for more than two months. Carpenter hit two home runs in his first game back and went deep again the next day. The Tigers won both games and have been one of the hottest teams in baseball ever since.
All of a sudden, they are in the thick of the wild-card race with a 79-73 record. Detroit won its weekend series against the Baltimore Orioles and took the first two games of its series against the Kansas City Royals, with a third game coming Wednesday night at 7:40 p.m. ET.
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The 27-year-old Carpenter has been a key figure in the Tigers’ late-season playoff push. In 28 games since returning to the lineup, he is hitting .284 with seven home runs and 21 RBIs.
On Sept. 11, he went 4-for-4 and was a home run shy of hitting for the cycle against the Colorado Rockies. Two days later, he hit the decisive homer in a 1-0 victory over the Orioles. Detroit is 43-35 in games Carpenter plays and 36-38 in games he does not.
“We’re really excited,” he said after his 4-for-4 performance. “We just know how good we are as a team when we play at our best, and we’ve been playing at our best a lot recently. It’s been a blast to be a part of.”
After finishing 4 for 4 at the plate and one home run shy of the cycle, Kerry Carpenter is tonight's @FamilyCooling Player of the Game! #RepDetroit pic.twitter.com/kGBSsIPj3s
— Bally Sports Detroit (@BallySportsDET) September 12, 2024
A 19th-round draft pick by the Tigers in 2019, Carpenter made his MLB debut in August 2022, and he’s remained in the big leagues almost exclusively since. He hit .278 with 20 home runs in 118 games with the Tigers in 2023, his first full season at the highest level.
While not playing much due to the COVID pandemic in 2020, Carpenter’s life was forever altered by the passing of his father that year. The tragic loss forced him to ask some hard questions, and he eventually turned to his faith. He started reading his Bible and made Christ the center of his life for the first time.
His newfound faith caused him to view baseball and his purpose within the sport differently.
“It just kind of manifested in freedom and peace that Christ gave me on the field because that’s something that before I knew Christ I never had,” he said on the Sports Spectrum Podcast in March 2023. “Never. Never played a baseball game in freedom or peace.”
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Though Carpenter has enjoyed a promising start to his MLB career, not everything has gone perfectly. He’s battled injuries as well as the inevitable ebbs and flows of the long baseball season. Appearing on the Sports Spectrum Podcast again in January, he said that he sees his struggles as an opportunity to point others to the Lord.
“One of my purposes, I really feel, is that God has put me here to go through those ups and downs and to show that my ups and downs don’t affect my identity,” he said. “That’s something I always think about, always want to be a witness. I always want to be an ambassador.”
Carpenter has never been one to set statistical goals or obsess over numbers. He knows that he performs his best when he is playing free because of the hope he has in Christ.
“That’s really my goal, is to play free,” he said on the podcast in January. “My goal is to reach my full potential, and I believe that the only way you can reach your full potential is in Christ.”
The Tigers enter Wednesday’s series finale against the Kansas City Royals 1.5 games back of the Minnesota Twins for the final wild-card spot. If Detroit were to make the playoffs, it would be the team’s first postseason appearance in a decade.
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