[…] Tigers fans are not exactly thrilled at landing powerless Sean Casey, even though he cost Detroit the equivalent of a mechanical pencil. (Tigerblog) […]

The cost was low, but in a season like this who cares? Casey is not an upgrade over Shelton, and there’s a very good chance that he’s a downgrade.

After Young’s performance at first base yesterday, I’d say one more solid field at 1B in the form of Casey’s a good pickup. Let’s keep Young at DH.

Young is a substandard DH, and Casey is no better than Shelton. No one has given me even a single reason why Casey will be better than Shelton. His OBP is higher, so there’s one reason, but as we’ve already discussed, this is more than offset by Shelton’s power. Casey has ZERO power. He’s an overrated defender, while Shelton is an underrated defender. Sure, it didn’t cost us much, but it doesn’t fix anything. On top of everything else, Shelton has more upside, even for the rest of this season, than Casey by virtue of their relative ages alone.

Young is not good. I just do not understand why everyone still thinks he is. That was 3 years ago. At this point we’re better off sending Young down and having Casey take HIS place on the roster. Nobody realizes how bad Young is likely to be. He refuses to take a walk, and when these hits stop falling he will be a striking-out, grounding-itno-double-plays disaster.

Sure Casey is a decent player but like dan said, getting him and sending down Shelton doesnt fix anything. We had a chance to go for the throat and we didnt. We could have made a move to put us ove the top and we didnt. now instead of relaxing this august and september, we have to pray that the collapse doesnt happen. The pitching is strating to slide, hitters are looking the free swinging buch we have seen in the past. The twins show no signs of slowing down while we show many signs of slowing.

What’s the big deal about power? The Tigers still have 6 guys that can hit 20+ homeruns and knock players in. They need baserunners just as much.

Sure, they don’t have a bona fide power hitter, but almost any one of them, at any time, can hit a home run.

Shelton has exactly six home runs in his last 262 at bats. That does not describe power in the least. After the fielding fiascos in the last two days, Casey is an upgrade. How many times did a Shelton strikeout kill a rally this season when a walk would have done a job. He grounds into double plays, but Shelton pops out (a lot) with first base unoccupied from swinging at pitches high out of the strike zone.

It’s a good trade for a left-handed bat if you ask me. If they don’t win it all this year, they will be poised for years to come because they didn’t give up anything in return.

I’m not saying it was a bad trade. It wasn’t, mostly because we didn’t give up much. What I’m saying is that it doesn’t make the Tigers that much better, and it’s a distinct possibility that it didn’t make them better at all. Casey is overrated as a fielder, while Shelton is underrated. He doesn’t draw any more walks than Shelton does, and the difference between their OBPs can be chalked up to a bunch of extra singles for Casey. Singles are good, but Shelton is going to hit more doubles and homers. It’s not going to kill me to have Shelton out of the lineup, but that isn’t the point. The point that Mike and I are making is that the Tigers didn’t add anything to put the division away. Some of our pitchers are either starting to slip or are well into a collapse. When Monroe becomes his old self, the Craig Monroe who has been bad for about 2000 major league plate appearances, and Dmitri Young cools down, this offense is going to be in major trouble. If you think Casey is going to help fix that you’re setting yourself up for disappointment. He is a very overrated player.

This is to say nothing of the fact that he’s coming over from the National League, which is the lesser league. TI don’t believe the difference isn’t quite as large as ESPN thinks it is, but it’s true that players from the NL tend to be not quite as good when they move to the AL, while players from the AL tend to see a spike in their numbers. He’s left-handed, so that’s good, but other than that it does very little, if anything at all, for us. From listening to the Tigers the last couple of months you’d think that the general quality of the hitter is a total non-issue as long as he bats left-handed. Pretty ridiculous.

Craig Wilson is a much better hitter than Casey. David Delucci would have been a better pickup. Carlos Lee. There were options, and we picked up a mediocre player when we’re in the middle of a magical season.

Agreed. we had a chance to get alot better and it wouldnt have “cost us the farm”. Craig wilson went to the yankees for the flesh and blood equivolent of 6 bags of fertilizer (chacon). Delucci was availble…Tom Gordon was avaialbe… there were tons of non-Soriano moves they could have made to really really make this team a force. the Yankees got a ton better. a ton. if they dont get the wild card the red sox will. we need to win the division. an 7 1/2 game can evaporate in, well, 7 1/2 games. The casey trade on paper is a goos trade because we didnt give anything up. but it made us marginally better if that.

Tom Gordon would have been a great pickup.