Another bad performance from veteran starter Kenta Maeda, who received boos from fans when he made his final walk from the mound to the dugout with an ERA of 7.26, buried the Detroit Tigers in a six-run hole in the early innings of Tuesday's game.

But there were cheers to come, as the Tigers' offense — thanks to home runs from three different players — clawed all the way back to tie the game at seven runs in the seventh inning.

The impressive comeback effort fell short, however, as the Tigers lost, 9-8, to the Cleveland Guardians in the 10th inning Tuesday in the second of four games in the series at Comerica Park.

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The Guardians scored two runs in the top of the 10th, and the Tigers could answer with just one run in the bottom of the frame, though they got the tying run to third base. The Tigers (43-49) had their four-game winning streak snapped.

Right-handed reliever Will Vest, who completed the ninth inning, took the mound for the top of the 10th inning, with the free extra-inning runner on second base.

A single from All-Star starting outfield Steven Kwan, hitting .363 this season, put runners on the corners. An ensuing groundout provided two runners in scoring position but left first base open with one out, so the Tigers intentionally walked All-Star José Ramírez — for the third consecutive plate appearance — to load the bases.

Fellow All-Star Josh Naylor, who'd failed to produce after the two previous intentional walks to Ramírez, this time slapped Vest's two-strike fastball, located middle-middle, into center for an RBI single and an 8-7 lead. The Guardians extended their lead to 9-7 with Brayan Rocchio's sacrifice fly to left field, scoring Kwan.

In the bottom of the 10th, Guardians right-handed reliever Emmanuel Clase — another All-Star, as one of the best closers in baseball — retired the first two batters with balls in play, allowing Carson Kelly to cut the Tigers' deficit to 9-8 with a sacrifice fly. Gio Urshela and Wenceel Pérez produced back-to-back singles, but Justyn-Henry Malloy lined out to center, stranding runners on the corners and ending the game.

The Guardians stranded the bases loaded — Kwan (single), Ramírez (intentional walk) and Naylor (walk) — in the eighth inning with left-handed reliever Andrew Chafin on the mound.

Pinch-hitter David Fry flew out to left field.

Left fielder Riley Greene didn't pick up the fly ball right away, but he recovered with plenty of time to catch the ball for the third out in the eighth.

Greene laughed on his way back to the dugout.

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Comeback Cats

Trailing 6-0, the Tigers scored two runs in the third inning, one run in the fourth and four runs in the sixth.

Colt Keith put the Tigers on the board, cutting the deficit to 6-2, with a two-run home run to right field off right-hander Ben Lively. The 22-year-old Keith has five homers in his past 14 games, bringing him to eight homers in his 81-game rookie season.

A leadoff triple from Urshela — his first extra-base hit since June 12 — led to the Tigers' third run, as he scored from third base to make it 6-3 when Wenceel Pérez grounded out for the second out in the fourth inning.

The Guardians increased their lead to 7-3 in the top of the sixth inning, but the Tigers responded with a four-run bottom of the sixth, ignited by singles from Keith and Kelly.

With two outs, Urshela launched a three-run home run — his first homer since June 1 — to left-center, cutting the Tigers' deficit to 7-6.

Urshela turned on a first-pitch sinker from Lively.

That's when the Guardians replaced Lively with right-handed reliever Nick Sandlin, but Malloy greeted Sandlin by crushing his middle-middle slider for a solo home run, tying the game at 7-7.

Malloy is hitting .198 in the first 28 games of his rookie season, but he has five homers.

Lively allowed six runs on seven hits and one walk with four strikeouts across 5⅓ innings, throwing 80 pitches. HIs ERA jumped from 3.14 to 3.59 in his 15th start.

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Kenta Maeda struggles again

Maeda allowed six runs on seven hits and one walk with two strikeouts across 2⅔ innings, throwing 49 pitches. He surrendered three runs in the first inning and three runs in the third inning.

The Guardians hit two home runs in the first inning.

Maeda signed a two-year, $24 million contract with this Tigers in December 2023. The 36-year-old has allowed 15 runs in his past two starts, spanning just 6⅓ innings.

In the second inning, Maeda struck out Austin Hedges for the 1,000th strikeout of his eight-year MLB career, becoming the third Japanese-born player (along with Yu Darvish and Hideo Nomo) to reach the milestone.

He generated three whiffs on 22 swings — a 13.6% whiff rate — with one splitter, one slider and one sweeper. His four-seam fastball averaged 91.1 mph. The Guardians averaged a 94.9 mph exit velocity on 12 balls in play against him.

Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Tigers just miss rally in 9-8 (10) loss to Cleveland Guardians