OT Tigers' run of being sort of a contender every year

Submitted by Rodriguesqe on

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stephenrjking

May 28th, 2017 at 10:21 PM ^

What's the point of "fire Ausmus?"

1. Ausmus can't make meh hitters hit, can't make bullpen arms or Zimmerman pitch well, can't make old guys healthy.

2. If he is, nonetheless, managing poorly, in what way does it make the team's situation measurably worse? They're not good right now. A great manager still isn't going to turn this into a playoff team.

3. If he is a bad manager, what's the harm in letting him absorb these bad years that will be bad anyway, so that when there's a chance for things to turn up, you can get a guy that might actually have a chance?

I think Ausmus comes back next year for a team that will compete for the basement, in large part so he can fall on the sword after it's over.

Bigku22

May 28th, 2017 at 10:37 PM ^

Agreed, there is no point. Baseball managers have less direct correlation to team improvement/success than any other sport. It's just an easy way for fans to place blame and direct frustration. 

Not saying he's a good manager, just that firing him is irrelevant. The team is not good enough to contend regardless of who the manager is.  

WMUgoblue

May 28th, 2017 at 6:59 PM ^

Has anyone besides possibly Zimm been more of a disappointment than Castellanos? His metrics suggest he'll turn it around but he's now chasing outside the zone any chance he gets.

Rodriguesqe

May 28th, 2017 at 7:07 PM ^

Strong chance he pulls a Tony Clark and hits 40 hrs this year, 36 of them coming after the Tigers are 10 games out of first. 

I don't watch enough games lately to get frustrated with him. He looked like he was going to have a huge year. Bad luck snowballed into mental meltdown I guess?

As for fire Ausmus, what would be the point right now? Can't dethaw every hitter or get every starter save Fulmer to stop sucking. We're paying Pelfrey 8 million to pitch better than Verlander this year. All we can hope is guys play well enough to boost their trade value, and that Avila is smarter than he's shown so far.

ckersh74

May 29th, 2017 at 12:06 AM ^

Tony Clark would be hitting about .220 in mid-June with about 8 homers and 30 RBI. Once the team reached about 15-20 games under .500 he'd start to hit. Then all of a sudden it was October, and Clark wound up hitting about .280 with 30 homers and 100 RBI on a team that won about 70 games. 

Carlos Pena, OTOH, would hit about .235, dick-tease us until August, and hit about .240 with 20 homers and 65 RBI with 150 K's. Dude managed to walk 101 times in 2011 and still found a way to hit a whopping .225.

reddogrjw

May 28th, 2017 at 7:05 PM ^

SP

JV and Zim on long term deals

got to let the kids Fullmer, Boyd and Norris pitch

dump KRod and go with more kids in the pen

deal Kinsler and JD Martinez (and Vmart if you can)

ckersh74

May 28th, 2017 at 8:24 PM ^

Verlander is signed through 2019, two more years, with a vesting option for 2020 if he finishes in the top 5 for the Cy in 2019. Hardly a long-term contract.

Zimmerman is a problem. Period.  This one's gonna hurt. 

There's NOTHING behind Kinsler in the farm system, unless you want to see a daily dose of Machado and his .611 OPS. 

JD is getting dealt in July, when we can maximize the return for him. The outfield options behind him are at least a year away yet.

We still don't have a CF. 

Miggy is going to haunt this team after about 2019, once he gets to 3,000 hits. We're married to him through 2023. 

Miggy and JD have 10/5 rights, so they can veto any trades. 

We're boned. And we're going to be boned for a few years. By 2019 the two worst teams in the AL are likely to be the Angels and the Tigers. 

Commie_High96

May 28th, 2017 at 9:41 PM ^

There is no underestimating how giving that contract to Verlander screwed the Tigers. He got millions plus Kate Upton, stoped trying to pitch and the tigers got screwed for a generation. Never sign pitchers to a long term contract, death.

Verlander has been shit ever since. AAlso, we are allergic to signing decent relievers....e.g. Phil Coke.

Brian Griese

May 28th, 2017 at 7:05 PM ^

in the minors either. I went to the mud hens game last night against the yankee affiliate and, oh boy, not much there to speak of. Contrast that with the Yankees, who have a bunch of kids tearing the Show up and have the number 3 prospect in baseball at shortstop in AAA.

ckersh74

May 28th, 2017 at 8:37 PM ^

The problem is, if  we're starting now, it's going to be at least a couple years before we see anything. In the meantime, we've got a hole in CF, a soon-to-be hole in RF, a black hole at 2B (if we deal Kinsler, who is going to be 35 either way), a hot dog SS who's a legend in his own mind, and leaky back half of the rotation. We're also short bullpen arms, too. 

Hello, 70-win seasons. 

Bigku22

May 29th, 2017 at 8:55 AM ^

"Starting now", I don't think even if we took that stance it would matter. The only time the Tigers farm system had any real talent in the last 20 years was when Illitch decided to spend money under the old draft rules (where the rich teams got the best players regardless of draft position) and we paid for Verlander, Porcello, etc.

The scouting, talent evaluation, and especially our international scounting is all bottom 5 in baseball. 

We only turned it around because we decided to spend more money than most other teams. The farm system has never really been fixed. 

StephenRKass

May 29th, 2017 at 3:09 AM ^

The Yankees have a good farm system. Also watch out for the White Sox. They have 7 guys in the mlb.com top 100 2017 prospects, The average ranking is 35, and they have two of the top positional players in Moncada (ranked one) and newly signed Cuban free agent Luis Robert, a 19 year old who they just won a bidding war for against St. Louis. He is the top ranked international amatuer player out there. Arguably, if he works out, he is a generational talent. Reinsdorf opened up the checkbook and paid a cool 50 mil to get him.

The reason I mention the Sox is they recognized the need to rebuild, so they traded Chris Sale and Adam Eaton last year for a boatload of prospects. Oh, and they also have the number 11 pick in the 2017 draft. It'll be another year or two, but they will be competitive for a long, long time. If Moncada and Robert are as good or better, along with 4 pitching prospects in the top 50, watch out. Sometimes, you just have to blow everything up.

ckersh74

May 28th, 2017 at 10:01 PM ^

If you're going to trade Verlander or Cabrera, assuming that they both waive their 10/5 rights, you're going to do 1 of 2 things:

1) eat a ton of their salary and get a decent return

2) eat little of that contract and get a stale hot dog and a moldy ham sandwich. 

EDIT: I think you and I both know that Chris Ilitch is going to have next to NO stomach to eat a chunk of salary big enough for these two particular talents to play (and beat him) elsewhere. This isn't Mike Pelfrey we're talking about here. 

Hott Karl

May 28th, 2017 at 7:45 PM ^

There's plenty of blame to go around, and I am going to give Lloyd McClendon his share as well. I know they are major league hitters, but this team has regressed at the plate since Wally Joyner left to pursue other opportunities.

cali4444

May 28th, 2017 at 8:09 PM ^

Tiger friends for 2 to 3 years now... 'Our core is past their prime, the window is closing, big men like Miggy usually don't age well. Wait for Verlander and Miggy to get on a hot streak and trade them for for all the young talent you an get.'  Well, too late for that now.  We're looking at some lean summers in Motown.

Bigku22

May 28th, 2017 at 8:20 PM ^

We are in a weird spot. We have some nice young arms, and look to have a really solid rotation built for years to come (Fulmer, Norris, Boyd). However, the payroll is too high for our market, Ilitch spent big on absurdly long deals his last few years and we are being weighed down by a couple huge albatross contracts. With rumors the family could possibly sell the team, they will likely want to cut payroll to make the entitiy profitable again. 

Also, our farm system is one of the worst in baseball. Dombrowski traded every prospect we had worth a damn, and our international scouting is atrocious. 

We are left with a team with a mix of some aging talent, a couple developing young arms, but no means to further financially invest in the squad, and no farm system to bolster the ranks. 

We will probably be in a slow decline for the next few years, hard to really gauge the direction of the team past that since the owner, GM, and coach could all be different within a few years. 

Bo Schemheckler

May 28th, 2017 at 8:28 PM ^

Honestly, we aren't competing for at least 3 years so if anyone wants to send us a truckload for either or the Wilson's or norris/boyd I would be fine with that. Fuller seems like the only player I wouldn't trade and even then if someone really overpaid I would be ok with it.

SalvatoreQuattro

May 28th, 2017 at 8:31 PM ^

Tigers are sliding back into a funk as have the Wings. Pistons lack the star to be good.

The Lions are in the best position to win a title at this point and that is sad.

ckersh74

May 28th, 2017 at 8:40 PM ^

The Wings are going to be this bad as long as Ken Holland is GM. The Pistons are in purgatory. You're not going to get that much at the end of the lottery, and Gores does not have the stomach to sit through multiple seasons with win totals in the 20's. The Tigers badly need to re-tool, and that's if we have a competent player development system. 

Bob Quinn has been around a championship organization before he came here. He gets the benefit of the doubt.....for now. 

rob f

May 28th, 2017 at 8:52 PM ^

the Tigers have gone 12-20, playing .375 ball. In all likelihood, the Tigers we have seen over the last 32 games are very likely about what we should expect over the remainder of the season. Other than the very consistently good Fulmer, what is there that gives much hope the Tigers might be able to turn it around?

Yeah, sure, there's Verlander---but keep in mind that he gets the ball only every 5th day. Every other starting pitcher is either young, inexperienced and highly likely to be inconsistent at best; or is named Zimmerman and is washed up. And don't even get me started on the bullpen...

As for the team's offense, I'll recite these names: Romine, Iglesias, Collins, Mahtook, McCann, Upton, Castellanos, Avila, and 3 oft-injured old guys. With most of them hitting .230 and/or having a career track record near or below that mark, this isn't exactly "Murderer's Row" opposing pitching is up against.

Like others have more-or-less already stated, our best hope is that enough of the present roster gets healthy and productive enough over the next 7 weeks that they can reap some young talent at the July trade deadline. If you recall, we got Fulmer by trading talent for youth, and with the current state of the Tigers farm system, trading for youthful talent appears to be our only option.

Sad to see and to have to admit it, but the window for this team slammed shut a couple seasons ago.

redwhiteandMGOBLUE

May 28th, 2017 at 9:29 PM ^

And the panacea of making trades with this roster comes down to Kinsler and J.D. which is fine but we're then relying on a garbage GM to make these trades. Add in even worse scouting and development staff to try and turn young talent into MLB players and the future is nothing short of a black hole.

xtramelanin

May 28th, 2017 at 9:29 PM ^

how was the play?

sadly, what you say is dead on, as a few others have opined.  not a great outlook for most of the pro sports  in detroit, but remember, lots of teams surprise at some point.  maybe the wings/pistons/tigers/lions will be one of them. 

stephenrjking

May 28th, 2017 at 10:16 PM ^

I think it's possible that they rebound a bit from the funk they're in right now; my guess is that they flirt with .500 again, perhaps to stick and perhaps not.

But that's all relative. Even the best-case scenarios for this team as constructed aren't competitive for postseason placing. The bottom can fall back out from under the bullpen at any time, the starting rotation has some promising arms but no killers, half the lineup is replacement level, and the other half is inconsistent, old, or both.

The JV contract is working out better than I thought it would. He might even be tradeable, though I'm a bit reluctant to pull the trigger on that. Miggy, OTOH...

Let's put it this way: at some point these "blips" aren't going to be blips anymore, they're going to be decline. It has really already started--a once consistently healthy player keeps getting dinged up. He still has stretches of brilliance, but the slumps get prolonged. His overall effectiveness continues to decline with age.

The crazy thing about his contract is that they signed it two years early, and it was clear it was a huge mistake at the time.