Archive for the '2010 Tigers' Category

Alright, it’s almost silly to try to predict what the Tigers roster will look like  on Opening Day, but that’s not going to stop me from taking a stab.  Keep in mind, this isn’t what I WANT to happen, it’s a prediction and it doesn’t look pretty.  Also keep in mind, I have no inside information so this is just speculation.  Anyway, let’s take a look at a projected opening day lineup:

1)  Ryan Raburn  LF – Raburn doesn’t have the OBP you’d want from a leadoff hitter but he landed there in 13 starts last year. 
2)  Carlos Guillen DH – Guillen moves back to third after Curtis Granderson and Brandon Inge are traded to the Angels.
3)  Magglio Ordonez RF – Where else, although he’ll be splitting time with Wilkin Ramirez so he doesn’t have a big payday in 2011.
4)  Miguel Cabrera 1b
5)  Clete Thomas  CF – See Guillen above for Granderson’s fate.
6)  Bobby Crosby SS – Until he gets hurt and Ramon Santiago gets in there.
7)  Scott Sizemore 2b – Future All Star if you believe the hype
8)  Brandon Wood 3b – Wood is one of the guys the Tigers get, along with prospects, in their trade with the Angels.
9)  Gerald Laird C

The big move will have the Tigers sending Granderson and Inge to the Angels for Wood and a couple or three prospects.  And now the pitchers:

1)  Justin Verlander – Duh
2)  Rick Porcello 
3)  Armando Galarraga – I think Galarraga will have a bounce back year.  Not like 2008, but definitely better then 2009.
4)  Nate Robertson – He could be trade bait if he has a good second half.  They won’t be able to move him now, so you might as well ride and see if you can get him anything at the deadline if he performs.  Plus I’ve always been a fan of Nate’s so there’s some wishful thinking here.
5)  Jon Kibler – I have a fondness for Spartans and I think Kibler will be the surprise out of camp.  He pitched okay in a hitter’s league on a mediocre Erie team last year. 

Edwin Jackson is also traded.  My guess is he goes to the Yankees again for prospects.  The Yankees have said they want to cut payroll so Jackson would be a low cost plug in rather then spending big money on a guy like Halladay.  I think Ryan Perry will be the closer out of camp and Fu-Te Ni will start out as his set up man.

The next question would then be, if I’m right, how many wins does this team end up with?

In case you missed it, Kurt over at Mack Avenue Tigers has done a really good series of columns on Dave Dombrowski.  He finishes things up with some comments from other bloggers, but if you missed it, be sure to back and read the complete series.

If you want even more Dave Dombrowski, be sure to check out Bill’s interview of the general manager.  Bill also wrote a really cool piece on Dombrowski in the The Hardball Times Baseball Annual 2008.  It looks like there’s still some in stock but its a seven page summary on Dombrowski’s GM style.

Jon Paul Morosi is now saying the rumor on the street is Miguel Cabrera will probably stay with the Tigers.  My guess is his salary will make it cost prohibitive but we’ll see.  I also don’t like the Granderson to the Angels rumor because, this validates a prediction I heard yesterday.  Not that I want to prove the other guy wrong, just that I don’t want to see Granderson leave Detroit.

I found the “Tigers fielding a contendor in 2010” quote a little disingenuous though.  Who are they trying to fool?

Jason Beck has brought up the fact that the Tigers may be looking to Bobby Crosby as a backup plan if the Tigers don’t sign Adam Everett.  Crosby’s career has been an injury filled one so there’s definitely some risk there.  I know Adam Everett won’t light it up at the plate, but he’s a solid defender and if there’s a spot where you want to give up some offense for defense, it’s at shortstop.  And Crosby has played six seasons and in only two of those has he gone more then 100 games.

I guess if the Tigers can’t come to a decent agreement with Everett then Crosby would be an option.  It just has me worried that the Tigers might have an injury prone shortstop to go with a rookie second baseman.  That’s probably way too many at bats for a guy like Ramon Santiago.

This is according to Buster Olney’s blog (Insiders Only), but apparantly the Tigers aren’t shopping Curtis Granderson as aggressively anymore.  There’s a quote from an official who says the outcry over Granderson may have caused the Tigers to take a step back on trading the popular centerfielder.

After breaking his ankle during the Arizona Fall League, Scott Sizemore should get off crutches today.  This is pretty important since Sizemore has all but been named as the Tigers second baseman after the Tigers declined to offer Placido Polanco arbitration.  Right now, the best alternative to Sizemore at second would be Ramon Santiago but I think he’s proven he’s a reliable fill in off the bench, not neccesarily a guy who can start every day.

It looks like Placido Polanco could go back to his old team.  What’s funny was these rumors broke a month or so ago, then they were muted.   I’m sure the Phillies didn’t want to overplay their hand and it might have paid off because now they can get Polanco and not have to give away their draft pick.   The move would also move Polanco to third base.

B illy Wagner was one of the guys who some thought might end up in a Tigers uniform in 2010 but it looks like he’ll be signing with the Braves.  He’ll make $7 million and that kind of sets the market for all of those closers out there.  I also read that both Fernando Rodney and Brandon Lyon were being looked at by the Yankees.  The Winter Meetings are next week so things should get interesting pretty quickly.

It looks like despite Ernie Harwell’s health problems that he hasn’t lost his sense of humor.  His ears must have been burning because Alan Trammell and Kirk Gibson were telling stories about him at a talk in Grosse Pointe when he showed up at the top of the steps.  This looks like an event that was well worth attending and I’d be interested to hear from anyone who was there.

My latest business report is up over at the Hardball Times.  It was a slow week but I touch on Bud Selig’s retirement and where salaries landed in 2009.

The Tigers decision to not offer Placido Polanco arbitration is pretty telling and rather worrisome.  Basically it looks like the Tigers are maxed out and they don’t even want to take the chance at picking up Placido Polanco’s contract in the event he took arbitration.  This, when you take it with all of the trade rumors, is a little troubling and my bet is, a lot of people who have been sitting on the fence with regards to their season tickets are going to step off.  I know having those draft picks looming hurts Polanco’s signability but still.

It’s also the first REAL sign that the Tigers are more worried about cutting costs then they are about winning.  I know there’s high hopes for Scott Sizemore, but Polanco brought both a reliable bat and glove at a pretty key spot.  Sizemore’s had one good season and a couple of decent ones and while I think his glove is there, you have guys like Jeff Larish who could rake and who still struggled at the plate at the big league level.

Fernando Rodney and Brandon Lyon were both offered arbitration.  My guess is Lyon takes it and Rodney tests the market.  Of course I was wrong about Polanco so who knows.

Jason Beck also answered some emails.  He talked about all of the money coming off of the Tigers books at the end of 2011.  I also liked the one about what the Tigers do on their off days between road series.

According to this article, SI’s John Heyman has said that the Mariners rejected a deal that would have sent Edwin Jackson to Seattle for Brandon Morrow and Shawn Kelly.  I already talked about Morrow but I don’t know much about Kelly.

Five Tigers are up for This Year in Baseball Awards.  You can run down all of the Tigers on the ballot thanks to the Free Press and you can vote at the Tigers Official Website.

The Detroit News is getting into the prospect game and Lynn Henning lists out his top 20 prospects.  There sure do seem to be a lot of top 20 (and ten or eleven) lists floating out there already.  He puts Casey Crosby over Jacob Turner and he has Ryan Strieby all the way down at eight.  Not sure why he left off Al Avila, unless he doesn’t consider him a prospect anymore.  Also at the Free Press is a solid column on baseball in Panama.

Also, I’ve gotten a couple of emails about my comment about Lou Whitaker getting the shaft.  Way back when Ryne Sandberg got elected, I ran down the numbers and to help back up my case, Beyond the Boxscore also picked up the fight.

Alright, Tuesday is the arbitration and the Tigers, as highlighted by Lynn Henning, have some decisions to make.  Placido Polanco, Fernando Rodney and Brandon Lyon are all eligible and if the Tigers offer and they sign with someone else, then the Tigers get some draft picks.  Polanco, as a Type A free agent, is particularly juicy.  The problem is, one more of these guys, as Henning mentions, might rather take there chances with the Tigers then test what’s going to be a rough free agent market.

Polanco is the most interesting and in my opinion, is the guy we have the least to lose on.  If he takes up our offer, it means Scott Sizemore gets another year of seasoning and we have Polanco’s reliable bat and glove back at second base.  I can live with that.  Of course if he declines, then we’ll get a couple of nice draft picks out of the deal.

Fernando Rodney and Brandon Lyon are in similar boats.  I can live with both guys coming back for another year, so I agree with Hennings prediction.  You offer arbitration and then take your chances.  Of course I’m not the one paying the guys so a player like Rodney might get entirely cut loose because he has the whole closer tag attached to him.

With the winter meetings a couple of weeks away, there’s not a lot to talk about so I’m not surprised MLB.com is rolling out a bunch of HOF information.  Jason Beck tackles the case for Jack Morris and how Jack has been lobbying for Bert Blyleven.  I’m kind of in the same boat.  I think Morris is HOF worthy, but not until Blyleven gets in.  I think this is finally Bert’s year so it wouldn’t surprise me to see Morris start making up some ground here in the next couple of years.

Of course I’m still bitter about Lou Whitaker getting bounced on his first ballot and Tram still wallowing with little chance of making up any ground.  Even Darrell Evans doesn’t get as much respect as he should have.  It’d be nice to see one of the 1984 Tigers get in the Hall.

MiLB.com is going through their annual organizational reviews and yesterday, Jonathan Mayo worked up the Tigers review.  He’s very optimistic about the Tigers pitching prospects and one thing he points out that I didn’t know was that all of the Tigers affliates finished with an ERA under 4.00.  Not too shabby.  There’s also some good quotes in there from Tigers farm director Glenn Ezell.  Kudos to Mayo for also nailing the Tigers top pitching prospect.  He missed on the position player prospect and went with Cale Iorg in the preseason but went with Brennan Boesch in the postseason.

Also, my latest Business of Baseball report is up at the Hardball Times.

The White Sox have been busy here in the early stages of the free agent season.  They inked Omar Vizquel to a one year deal earlier in the week and then yesterday, the signed Andruw Jones to a one year incentive laden deal.  While neither are long term options, it does give the White Sox at least someone to plug at a couple of open spots for a pretty low price. You wonder if these kind of guys are really going to cash in this year with all of the teams looking for bargains.

John Lowe wrote a nice piece on Rick Porcello.

There was plenty of trade talk over at the Free Press with Miguel Cabrera once again taking center stage.  John Lowe brings us all back to reality though and in his column he spells out why trading Cabrera will be so tough.  The contract is the obvious one.  He also discusses how the rumors may just be that and there’s not a lot of hard evidence that the Tigers are actively shopping the first baseman.

Kirkland Crawford then talks about how the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim have more interest in Curtis Granderson then they do Edwin Jackson despite the Angels already having a centerfielder in Torii Hunter.  It’s good to hear the Tigers are asking for a lot for both these guys but you wonder if it’s more a matter of “when” then “if” we’re going to see some big names shipping out of Detroit.

Finally, Jason Beck did one of his mailbag columns and he talked about the chances of trading Miguel Cabrera.  He also talks about how we’re probably not going to see much in the way of change at the back end of the rotation.  At least he didn’t mention Dontrelle Willis as an option.  I also like his short but sweet answer to the guy who asks about moving Wilkin Ramirez back to third base.

Not sure why my latest BOB Report isn’t up at the Hardball Times yet.  Maybe check later in the morning if you’re interested.  And if you’re looking for a Christmas gift for a baseball fan, be sure to check out the book.

First we had Curtis Granderson and Edwin Jackson.  Now the trade talks surround Miguel Cabrera in what would be the biggest salary dump of them all.  Lynn Henning wrote this morning about how things have now turned to Cabrera and it looks like the Boston Red Sox are the team being mentioned.  While I like the idea of getting Clay Buckholz in a Tigers uniform, I still think Cabrera is a keeper and a guy the Tigers can build around.  Of course there’s that whole $120 million committment that’s left to deal with.

If the Tigers farm system were that good, I might be more into this but it’s spotty at best from all of the trades.  Of course I guess it depends who the Tigers get for all of these guys.  If they look for players that’ll be ready around 2012, then going the savings route might make sense it’ll just be a long couple of years.  I just hope that people have delayed making their season ticket deposits because at least for 2010, things could go south in hurry.

I was surprised as anyone that Miguel Cabrera, of all people, got the lone non-Mauer first place vote for the AL MVP.  My guess is it might be the same guy who voted Justin Verlander first for the Cy Young but remember, two Detroit voters picked Magglio Ordonez over Alex Rodrigue back in 2007.  It’s just one of those quirky things that these guys like to do and you wonder why people don’t find these awards as credible anymore.

Anyway, Dave Cameron at Fangraphs runs down the reasons why whoever voted for Cabrera was foolish at best.  Even if you just look at the raw numbers, Mauer did just as much in a lot fewer games.

Alright, we’ve all heard the rumors that Curtis Granderson and Edwin Jackson are being shopped and both have quite a bit of value because they’re coming off of good seasons.  The question is, if you’re in a selling mood, is now the time to trade Justin Verlander?  His stock may never be higher then it is now for a few different reasons.  And just as a disclaimer, I’m not saying they should trade him or I want to trade him, I’m just working through the logic.

1. He’s coming off of a Cy Young caliber season.  If not for Zach Greinke’s special year, Verlander would have been one of four pitchers in what would have been a tossup for the award.  His 269 strikeouts were the most by a pitcher since Randy Johnson struck out out 290 in 2004 and his 240 innings pitched is the most by a Tiger since Jack Morris in 1990, his last year with the Tigers.
2. Whichever team has him can get him at a bargain for the next two years.  You have to assume whoever picks up Verlander is interested in inking him to a long term deal but even if both sides can’t agree, that gives the team some insurance that Verlander will be with the team longer then just one season.
3. The Tigers appear to be selling mode.  If they do deal Granderson and Jackson, the Tigers probably won’t contend in 2010 or 2011.  That means you’re basically wasting Verlander’s cheap years, possibly alienating him by putting a mediocre team around him and pushing him out anyway.  If the Tigers can assure Verlander they have a plan to build around him, they might be able to sell him but we’ll see.  

Now the reasons to keep him

1. We get him for two years at a discount.  Verlander has two more years of arbitration eligibility and that means the Tigers will get to keep him for two more years at a discounted salary.  That gives them two years to get the team back in order and to include him in the Tigers long term plans.  I know this was also one of the reason to trade him, but things kind of work out that way.
2. Verlander, if marketed right, could put fans in the seats.  I know he doesn’t have Mark Fidrych’s personality, but he’s fun to watch.  Especially in the later months if the Tigers are out of contention (if, I’m being optimistic), you could even adjust the rotation so he pitches at home more.  Verlander might even like that too because he’s a better pitcher at home (.676 OPS against) then he is on the road (.719).

Just one more note, trading Verlander, while not an immediate benefit, might make the Tigers think twice about then trading Jackson and Granderson.  They still might do that and do a complete dump, but it would give them some long term flexibility knowing that big $20 million a year contract isn’t looming in the near future.

Alright, Drew Sharp penned a column this morning about the Tigers paying the price for their 2006 gamble and while he brings up some good points he’s kind of all over the place.  First off, what does 2006 have to do with it.  Outside of trading for Gary Sheffield, the Tigers didn’t do too much to their team.  I think 2007, when they came close but didn’t beat out the Indians, was the Tigers undoing because instead of building within, they went for the quick fix and also signed guys like Nate Robertson and Dontrelle Willis to multi-year deals.

He also mentions the salary cap a couple of times in passing, almost in reponse to something Ilitch.  Maybe I’m nitpicking though because I whole-heartedly agree with his final paragraph.

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