DETROIT -- The Tigers keep taking hits to their lineup with injuries. But they keep on hitting. And after Tuesday’s 8-3 win over the Brewers at Comerica Park, they might be crashing the American League postseason picture.

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“There's no cashing in in September right now. We're all here, hungry,” said Spencer Turnbull, whose six scoreless innings helped Detroit erase the sting of a 2-5 road trip. “We can smell the blood in the water. We want to play in October. We've been dreaming about that for a while. Especially here in Detroit -- it's been a minute. I think we're all excited.”

The Tigers are hanging in despite a makeshift lineup that got a further scare when Jonathan Schoop suffered a right wrist contusion on a fourth-inning hit-by-pitch. One inning later, they batted around in a decisive five-run fifth inning.

“We are competing. We are competing very good and very hard,” manager Ron Gardenhire said before the game. “It's a fun team to watch -- and I'm sure at times it can be frustrating -- but we're competing. We're doing things that we haven't been able to get done the last couple years, and normally it's just one more hit away or one more good pitch away.”

On Tuesday, it wasn’t that close. As Jeimer Candelario hit first base on his two-run single in the decisive fifth, he was noticeably pumped. The Brewers had walked Miguel Cabrera on four pitches with first base open and two outs to get to Candelario in the cleanup spot, and he took notice. Three batters later, Candelario nearly ran over Cabrera to score from second base on Jorge Bonifacio’s two-run single.

According to the Brewers, the walk wasn’t intentional. Still, Candelario was excited.

“I'm always pumped, man,” Candelario said. “I always want to have that attitude, a good attitude. Not showing anybody up, but pumping myself to help the team win. You have the bases loaded there, you're trying to do your job. Thank God that I put a good swing on that ball. Get the job done and help the team win, that's what it's all about.”

Two innings and another Cabrera walk later, Candelario took a moment to watch his two-run homer carry 410 feet to left for an eight-run lead. While Cabrera became the 10th player in franchise history to score 1,000 runs as a Tiger, Candelario put up a four-RBI night, accounting for half of Detroit’s offense and continuing his breakout season since moving to cleanup shortly after C.J. Cron’s season-ending knee injury.

Candelario is now batting .370 (20-for-54) with three home runs and 13 RBIs in 15 games from the cleanup spot this year.

“You get a guy that's hot, and that's where you stick him,” Gardenhire said. “And at the time when we put him in there, he was starting to swing really well. We were trying to get three or four people that are swinging good together and you can score runs. But Candy has just stayed hot. He's confident, he puts some really nice swings out there and you can see the difference in everything -- the way he plays defense, the whole package. He's really positive and that's the guy.

“As we talked about all spring, we need this guy to do something -- and it's time. He's stepping up and getting it done.”

Behind Candelario, rookie shortstop Willi Castro -- who has surprisingly settled into the fifth spot in Detroit’s lineup after opening the season at the alternate training site in Toledo, Ohio -- opened the scoring with a two-out single in the fourth inning. An inning later, his speed beat out an infield single to set up Bonifacio’s single in the defining fifth.

“We have a lot of young, hungry guys here,” Candelario said. “They're trying to stay in the big leagues. This is a big opportunity for all of us to have success and help the team win. They're motivated right now. The opportunity is in their hands.”

So, too, is a playoff opportunity. For those who endured last year’s 114 losses, it would be especially meaningful.

“Sometimes we talk about that,” Candelario said of the postseason picture, “but we don't think about it too much, because we want to win a game. Today we turn the page, and we come tomorrow expecting to win a ballgame. That's the way we're thinking right now, and we're going to stick with that.”