The Detroit Tigers will face the Oakland Athletics in one of the American League's division series starting on Saturday. Detroit entered the night knowing that it would host two playoff games over the weekend, but the opponent was still unknown. With Oakland defeating the Texas Rangers to secure the A.L. West and the New York Yankees clinching the A.L. East, New York ascended to the top of the American League to play the winner of the wild card play-in game.

The A's and Tigers faced each other seven times in the regular season. The first four of those games came in mid-May in Oakland, with the two teams splitting the series. The next three games came a few weeks ago in mid-September, with the Tigers winning the first two games and Oakland salvaging the series in the final matchup of the series.

In those seven games, Detroit scored a total of 40 runs. The A's scored 35.