CLEVELAND -- Rookie Isaac Paredes hit a grand slam for his first major league homer and the Detroit Tigers snapped a 20-game losing streak against Cleveland by beating the Indians 10-5 on Friday night.
The Tigers also ended a nine-game slide that included being swept at home last weekend by the Indians.
Manager Ron Gardenhire is glad the drought is over.
"It's just basically getting that 20-game monkey off your back, and then nine, how many we lost in a row this year. Nine?" he said. "We needed a win more than anything else, it's not even about all that other stuff. After the win, yeah, we talked about it. We just needed to play a good ballgame and get a win for everybody to feel good about themselves."
"It's good we got all that other stuff out of the way though, because those kind of hang over you," he said.
Paredes, 21, connected in the fourth inning when the Tigers scored seven times off Adam Plutko (1-2), who was making his third start since taking over Mike Clevinger's spot in the rotation. Clevinger was recently demoted along with teammate Zach Plesac for breaking team coronavirus protocols.
Jonathan Schoop hit a two-run homer in the fourth as the Tigers topped the Indians for the first time since April 10, 2019.
Cleveland's 20-game dominance of Detroit was the second-longest streak against one opponent since division play began in 1969. Baltimore holds the record with 23 consecutive victories over Kansas City from 1969 to '70.
Victor Reyes also homered and Rony Garcia (1-0) picked up the win for the Tigers, who got off to a surprising 9-4 start before staggering.
Down 5-0 after starter Michael Fulmer got touched up early, the Tigers finally had the kind of inning a team needs to snap a long losing streak.
They chased Plutko with the seven-run outburst, the final four scoring on Paredes' slam, which came four days after the third baseman made his big league debut.
Plutko hurt himself with two walks and a hit batter in the inning. After he put Miguel Cabrera on leading off, Schoop followed with his sixth homer, a towering shot that left fielder Domingo Santana had trouble tracking and then covered his head with his glove for protection.
The Tigers loaded the bases on the hit batter, walk and two singles before Paredes lined a 1-2 pitch over the wall in left.
According to information provided by the Tigers, Paredes became the 10th player in club history to hit a grand slam for his first big league homer. He's the first to do so since Brennan Boesch in 2010. The previous MLB player to do it was Pittsburgh's Kevin Newman last year.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.