Tiger Geist

I’m giddy about Gary Sheffield’s release.  Healthy he’s awesome; this hasn’t happened since 2005.  Oh, right, he also was hanging out with Barry Bond then.  Whoops.

Interesting turn of events for the Tigers lately:

1. Spend most of the spring trying to figure out whether you want Ryan Raburn, Clete Thomas, or Brent Clevlen on the team.  Answer argument by trading for Josh Anderson.
2. Try to find a taker for Marcus Thames.  When a suitor can’t be found, do not save $2million-ish by cutting him.  Instead eat $14million by cutting Gary Sheffield.
3. Dontrelle Willis not pitching well?  No problem.  Find a bizarre blood test and put him on the DL.
4. Nate Robertson — – — – — – — ok, no answer for this one.
5. Dontrelle Willis and Nate Robertson not pitching well?  No problem.  Delegate Zach Miner to the bullpen.  Miner pitching really well — no problem; put Jeremy Bonderman on the DL and make no decision on Miner.

I think Dave Dombrowski and Jim Leyland made a tough decision today, a totally unexpected decision.  But what’s next? Anything else unexpected?

Random:  Found this article on espn about the original Sheffield trade from the Yankees.  Keith Law suggests that this trade would force Magglio to DH.

More random:  Ian points out the Rob Neyer article that kind of points out the obvious:  Mike Illitch may be paying out a lot of money for contracts in the next few years.  Some of it is poor decisions by Dave Dombrowski — yes.  But some of it was the fact that Detroit was so crappy for years that they overpaid for players — worked for the Pudge contract, jury is still out for Magglio.  Sheffield was a calculated risk — it was well documented that Gary was a pain in the ass in the last year of his contract; thats why Detroit had to extend his contract immediately.  But doesn’t Rob nullify his argument by calling out Miguel Cabrera’s contract in this article?  Do you really argue the contract of a 25 year old MVP candidate?

I guess it was easier then most of us thought… keep Thames, dump Gary Sheffield.  Obviously a surprise move (and it just about invalidated a post I did not 12 hours earlier), I totally agree with it.  Just did not see it coming.

Upon hearing the news, I assumed there was still a chance that Thames gets cut or traded — based on Detroit’s financial decisions as well as how they feel about Carlos Guillen’s play in left field — but this article seems to clear it all up.  Marcus on the team; rotating door at DH.  This also clears the way for more at-bats for lefty Jeff Larish; I bet he’ll get a few starts at third with a ‘defensive’ substitution in the sixth inning with Inge.

Do you think Sheffield had a long stare down with Jeff Larish as he walked out the door?

Kudos to you Mr. Dombrowski.  I also suggest everyone order a lot of Little Caesars this week.

Today’s Josh Anderson trade (and subsequent “he’ll be on the team” statement from the Tigers) brings up an important point:  Marcus Thames’ remaining stay with Detroit will be short.  Its been documented that his contract isn’t guaranteed, and he’s (probably) being actively shopped.  What I feel hurts Thames’ chances most may not be something he can control:  roster flexibility.

Here is the agreed starting lineup:  Laird, Cabrera, Polanco, Everett, Inge, Guillen, Granderson, Ordonez and Sheffield.  Your guaranteed backups:  Treanor, Santiago, and new Tiger Anderson.  Normal pitching staff of 12 leaves one spot remaining.  What do these position players lack?  Minor league options.  (Ok — fair point, i have no idea if Santiago has options, but they’re not moving the infield backup guy to Toledo).  This is the problem when you decide to trot out a full time DH for $14 million / year.  Here’s the deal:  I’ve seen Pedro Feliz behind the plate... guys get hurt.  If Laird takes a shot blocking home plate on a Saturday night game, and becomes day to day with a mild concussion… you need a backup catcher when the Sunday matinee roles around.  If Thames makes the team,  (in the above situation) your options are putting Laird on the 15 day DL and taking your chances with a career .200 hitter behind the plate, OR shorting yourself a pitcher for a few days (and sending a Bonine / Perry to Toledo briefly).  I don’t know if Raburn or Larish would be next in line if Thames doesn’t make the team (my money is on Larish), but they both have minor league options and could be sent down for a short time ‘in a pinch’.  This is the type of roster flexibility that teams need to be competitive.

As Jason Beck points out… if Thames can’t be traded and is given his walking papers.. is he really hurt?  He’ll catch on somewhere and probably hit 25 – 35 home runs in a full time role.  Couldn’t happen to a better guy;  win – win for both sides.  I’d love for him to DH for Detroit, but we have a team full of DH’s.  If winning is important for Detroit, Thames doesn’t make sense in 2009.  And truthfully, if playing full time is important to Thames, then Detroit doesn’t make sense for him.  Godspeed Marcus Thames.  Just sign with a team in the NL.

First thing that came to mind after hearing about the Rudy Darrow for Josh Anderson trade:  what?

Second thought:  He’s a faster, less powerful but will-hit-for-a-higher-average version of Matt Joyce.

So far, Edwin Jackson looks like the real thing.  Rudy Darrow, who knows.  If you think about it, if Detroit hadn’t made the Joyce for Jackson trade, they’d be in even worse of a position:  They still have a log-jam in the outfield, but they’d be hurting for starting pitching.  The only advantage of Joyce was that he still had options available (note:  Joyce has been hurt for most of this spring).

We don’t have a lot of data on what Joyce would turn into, but projecting his minor league numbers, with his half of a season professional numbers, has him looking like a power corner outfielder that won’t hit for average.  What doesn’t Detroit need right now?  Power hitters who don’t hit for average who can’t play center.

It seemed that Joyce projects to be a fourth outfielder;  looks like Anderson is more of a fifth outfielder.  But he absolutely fits a need:  Speed.  And, I’m still of the opinion that Clete Thomas is going to be a player, but needs more time.  Now he’ll get it.

If you’re basing a Rudy Darrow for Edwin Jackson trade, hands down Jackson is the better asset.  Based on Detroit’s lineup and projected minor league depth (corner outfielders it appears), is Josh Anderson that big of a downgrade from Matt Joyce?  I liked the Jackson trade, and I think I like this one too.  If you can spin it as essentially a Rudy Darrow for Edwin Jackson move, its a huge win… though maybe thats stretching it just a little bit.

Does this mean Ryan Raburn will return to Toledo?  (Probably).  If so, what position would he play?  Would he really be the first person called up in case of injury?  If not, why hold onto him (and his spot on the 40 man roster)?

Slowly catching up on the bay area baseball team news, and found some interesting blogs from the San Francisco Chronicle writer Henry Shulman.  Here, his tone seems to indicate he (and I imagine the team) are not too happy with a certain ex-Tiger shortstop:

Juan Uribe had a very nice day at short. He hit two doubles, drove in three runs and played well defensively. In fact, his solid play at short only underscored how lackluster Edgar Renteria has looked at the position.

Uribe is fighting for a job. Renteria is trying to prepare for the season. Does that make a difference? We’ll see how Renteria looks when the season begins and, as he promised, he picks up his game.

Yeah… that huge contract maybe wasn’t such a good idea.  The Giants are looking to play Pablo Sandoval at third right now, who is listed at 5′ 11″, 245 pounds.  Maybe conservatively listed (from what I saw of him at a game last September).  Though Sandoval seems to be playing the position well in spring, thats one U-G-L-Y left side of the infield for the small ball league.

In the same posting, Shulman talks about ex-Tiger outfielder Andres Torres‘ fight to make the team:

Andres Torres, the 31-year-old minor-league journeyman, is making an excellent case to be on the team. He went 2-for-5 today and raised his average to .426. He also runs like a cheetah and plays a good center field.

Seems to me he’s competing with Eugenio Velez for one spot. Of course, Velez has not been a slouch here either. He’s hitting .339 and had a two-run triple today.

Asked if they are competing for one spot, Bochy thought long and hard and said, “They’re similar players. They’re speed guys and good outfielders. Is it possible to have them both on the club? We’ll have to answer that soon.”

UPDATE:

Posted this before I got to read about the A’s… looks like they picked up Ex-Tiger third baseman (later turned back to catcher) Eric Munson yesterday to a minor league deal.  I never did understand why Detroit tried to make him an infielder.

I was talking to my dad about this while in Lakeland last week, and then Buster Olney started talking about it… and Mack Avenue Tigers had an excellent write-up about it… so its probably time i get my thoughts on paper.  Namely.. what’s going on with the Detroit Tiger’s finances.

Here are my thoughts:

1. I don’t trust any baseball team’s numbers.  They only report what they feel they have to report, based on attendance and payroll.  They may not have to report on merchandising, hot dogs, parking.  Its not an apples to apples comparison as what you get in the NFL, which has a salary cap.  The books are NOT open.
2. I can’t see how the (probable) dead contracts of someone like Dontrelle Willis really matters.  Its all talk — it’ll be written off as a loss on Illitch’s taxes.  People get paid big money to hide this stuff.  And rich people don’t like to pay taxes (nor do I, for the record).
3. Illitch has a ton of money.  Its called Illitch Holdings.  Mike may be worth X, but even his son is on the payroll (CEO).  They’ve got some cash.
4. Mrs. Illitch owns a casino.  By herself.  Unless they suddenly don’t get along, i’m sure she’s willing to give her husband a loan.
5. Mr. Illitch loves baseball.

The biggest comparison I can see here is to the DeBartolo family and the San Francisco 49ers.  Ed dumped all sorts of cash from the family’s fortunes into the football team that technically lost money in the their heyday.  Probably tons of money.  I’m not sure if the Illitchs are willing to dump money into the Tigers, but make no mistake, they could if they wanted to.

Interesting was an article by Marc Stein on a potential NBA lockout.  Here is what struck me:

“It’s not so much that NBA business is bad,” one high-ranking team executive told ESPN.com. “It’s not go-out-of-business bad.

“The problem is that a bunch of owners are getting killed in their non-NBA business. If owners are losing 30 percent or more of their net worth, they have no choice but to require their teams to make money. Owners can’t subsidize teams if their real businesses struggle.”

So, by this comparison, we should worry about the Tigers if the Illitch’s start laying off some of their 17k employees in Illitch Holdings.  I’m guessing the casino business is just fine, and I know the Red Wings (with the NHL salary cap) has to be a cash cow right now.  I’m sure the Tigers can handle a $10million loss for the year.  And, honestly, there is no value to sell off.  Ordonez, Robertson, Willis, and Guillen have NO value in the current market.  You’d have to toss in some major talent (and cheap) — Porcello, Perry, Verlander.  And that’s a short term payroll gain that will cost you down the line.  Attendance is the name of the game.  The April weather — any cold fronts coming in? — is as much as the enemy of the team as the state of the economy.

It’s been a busy few days; I’ve got some great pictures, watched some great spring games from fantastic seats, and had practical jokes planned against my dad backfire on me. But there is nothing like a few days in the sun (and joker marchant sells bells beer!) to get you excited about baseball. And I can’t say enough good things about stubhub.com; today’s seats were first row next to third base. We could have given jeff larish a cup check in the first inning after he tried to chase down a foul fly. More tomorrow after a game in ft myers vs the red sox; we’re excited for edwin Jackson.

Day one (er, 1.5) of our spring training action was an exciting game between Detroit and the Nationals.  Our seats were second row, right behind the on-deck circle and five seats from the Nationals’ dugout — thank you stub hub!  Pretty exciting game.  I’ve had spotty wifi coverage so I’ll just try to put down thoughts on players, etc

• Joker Marchant — as awesome as ever.  Even though one lucky usher didn’t seem to like me very much (obviously not a fan of tigergeist), we had great seats and there was easy access to facilities and… beer.
• Nate Robertson — as you’ve probably read, very effective.  A ton of movement on his pitches, though he wasn’t throwing very hard.  His off-speed pitch (maybe his slider??) was coming in around ~71mph and just dropped off the table.  Only notable ground ball was to Larish, who handled it easily.  Problems:  When the players got a good swing, they tagged the ball — quite a few warning track shots.  Good outing (4 innings, no runs).
• Umpires:  Very very very loose strike zone.  Robertson’s numbers weren’t as great if you include the number of called third strikes on both sides.  Good for Robertson, not good for Mike Hessman.
• Gary Sheffield:  The man can still swing a bat.  If healthy (a very very very very big if), he could have a monster year.  One shot that he crushed, another to the same spot but 30 feet closer (warning track fly ball).  And he works the count.  It did seem his elbows were up high, like they were in 2007.  My dad commented “I wouldn’t want to face him if i were a pitcher”, which i responded “I wouldn’t want to face him in a dark ally, either”.  He looks to be a little bigger this year then I remember his as well… thicker.
• Marcus Thames looked good in the batters box and in the field.  Very good at-bats.
• Jeff Larish is on the team;  he can swing a bat and can play an acceptable third base.  Especially if Robertson is going to give up all those fly ball outs.  There was a play on a foul pop-up that Larish mis-played that I felt Inge might get at, and that got Lyon into some trouble later on (he later walked the batter).  If there is a race for the 25th man, Larish isn’t in it.  He’s a solid 24th man right now.
• Wilkin Ramirez:  the man can play.  He’s large.  He still had some obvious flaws with breaking balls, but the Nationals knew it.  And a few times he’d go 0-2 quickly, only to see another three or four pitches.  He battled every pitcher and even in his outs, he saw six pitches.  He’s one to watch for sure — it seems like he gets it.
• Matt Treanor is a strapping young lad.
• Will Rhymes:  easy to see why Leyland likes this kid.  He hit a pop up to shallow center that was an easy play, but he swung and TOOK OFF — he was easily at second when it was caught.  Scrappy.
• Mike Hessman:  I don’t know why there isn’t some sort of work – share program between the Tigers and Lions.  This guy could be the Lions’ starting middle linebacker or defensive end — he’s a mountain of a man in person.
• Lyon was impressive working out of a jam that he pseudo-created.  Excellent breaking stuff that he can throw for strikes.
• Ni — an interesting delivery; we’ll see how he does in the minors.  Might have a future.
• Fien — not as crisp in this outing, for someone who is known as a strike-thrower, he seemed to mess around with the hitters too much in this outing.  But still effective.

Thoughts on the bullpen:

I think Detroit needs to take Williamson and Rincon north.  Not that they are the BEST pitchers in the system at the moment, but here is my fear:  Fien or Perry (or Rapada or Dolsi) make the team.  They have some issues…. who do you bring up?  Its pretty bare at that point (assuming Williamson and Rincon refuse an assignment to the minors after spring training — maybe they can, maybe they can’t).  It seems in Detroit’s best interest to have some insurance for the 2009 bullpen that they didn’t have in 2008.  Its not a question of money, since they’ll all be cheap.  But in terms of experience and depth (and lets not forget that Rodney isn’t a stranger to the DL), I think Leyland will give Rincon and Williamson every opportunity to make the team.

Photos will be up soon;  it was a beautiful day in Lakeland.  Today’s game is in Tampa against the dreaded Yankees (and the dreaded Yankee fans).  Today’s temp in Tampa:  80.  Go Blue tonight!  And congrats to the I-dont-like-them-but-my-sister-went-there Michigan State Spartans.

Interesting story of the day:

Friday, my father & I walked into JJ’s cafe in downtown lakeland for some breakfast, both wearing Tiger t-shirts.  The woman behind the counter kept making bizarre baseball references,  (“step up to the plate!”, “I didn’t know you guys were off today?”, etc).  I didn’t quite understand what was going on, my time zones are screwed up and I just wanted some french toast.  Finally my dad realizes what’s going on:  She thinks i’m Brandon Inge (we actually do look alike according to family friends, though they all agree if i went pro I would have hit at least .265 last year).  My dad politely told her that I wasn’t on the team, which she seemed to disagree with at first, but we assured her we were watching from the stands.  Later, when we’re eating, may dad remarks “i’m fine with her thinking you’re Inge as long as she didn’t think I looked like Leyland”.  Does this make Inge my tiger?

My flight to Tampa (via Cinncy) leaves in about 8 hours;  i had no idea that there were flights that left SFO before 6am.  But i’m on one.

My father & I are heading to Lakeland tomorrow to catch four tiger spring training games.  We’ve got Washington and Florida in Lakeland (Friday & Sunday), the Yankees in Tampa on Saturday (an impressive stadium that we’ve stayed by for two years but never been to), and then a drive down to Ft Myers for a Monday game against the Red Sox.  Monday’s game will be interesting, as I got the tickets via craigslist and had to befriend a Red Sox family from Boston who we’ll be sitting with at the game.

I’m pretty excited about this year;  we’ve got great seats via stubhub.  Due to conflicts, we almost couldn’t pull this year off, but some last minute vacation days popped up on my schedule.  Sad that neither my brother nor brother in law could make it this year, but I rented a giant telephoto camera lens to capture the moment.  Only downfall is now it appears we won’t see any of Detroit’s WBC players.

So I should have some game day blogs and pictures posted, though i’ll leave the twittering to Jason Beck.  Tomorrow, however, is a lost travel day.  And then onto the Lakeland nightlife!

Playing catch-up on my posts is never fun, since it takes me forever to find the links I refer to.  Anyway, some somewhat belated yet surprising news, and a very surprising possible destination for an ex-Tiger, and other thoughts.

1) Miguel Cabrera — Gold Glove third baseman?

This one baffles me.  As an average third baseman (and that might be putting it mildly), you’d think that a young Miguel Cabrera could turn into a pretty good, or at least above average, first baseman.  Every Tiger fan would be thrilled with his hitting prowess combined with acceptable results in the field.  Yet, there have been two reports that Cabrera might be turning the corner into a very respectable first baseman… dare someone say, “Gold Glove Winner”?  Initially, Lynn Henning mentioned it last week, stating:

Miguel Cabrera is rapidly becoming an All-Star defender at first base.

Ok, not much to back that up, especially with Cabrera gone for the last few weeks in the WBC.  But an interview with Andres ‘Big Cat’ Galarraga yieled a similar quote:

“I think he’s going to be a Gold Glove [winner] soon,” Galarraga said. “He can be that good.”

I have mucho mucho respect for the Big Cat, and I loved watching him play here in SF for a few seasons at the end of his career.  Here’s to hoping;  a gold glove winning first baseman can also be an MVP first baseman.

2) Pudge to the Giants?

More news that the Giants aren’t exactly happy with the prospect of Pablo Sandoval and Travis Ishikawa at the corners, there are rumors that they are considering signing Ivan Rodriguez.  As a backup catcher?  Nope.  Backup utility-man.  This sounds pretty crazy to me, but I bet Pudge would do well in a limited role in the National League.  However, this could backfire quickly for the Giants:  They are still getting flack for the Barry Bonds / Balco steroid issue.  (Ex managing partner) Peter Magowan and (GM) Brian Sabean were under the gun for… pretty much everything Bonds related.  Not sure they want to deal with Pudge and his, how you say, lack of a denial about testing positive for steroids in 2003.  When asked, Pudge said “Only God Knows”.  Well, that and the Federal Government.  Oh yeah, maybe those guys who broke the whole Balco story who happen to reside in San Francisco.  When you have baseball’s version of Woodward and Bernstein in the same area code, maybe this isn’t a great time to sign Pudge.

3) Pitching

I have a theory on this.  I’ll get to that.  Let’s say I think Zach Miner’s start tomorrow will be very important to him.  And I’m quietly happy that they are being cautious with Joel Zumaya, who may not be ready for opening day.  At the moment, it seems last year’s issues (bullpen questions, starting pitching strength) has been absolutely reversed.

4) Outfield

Wilkin Ramirez had an outstanding day today, and Ryan Raburn was solid defensively.  However, if this is becoming a race between Raburn the outfielder and Brent Clevlen the outfielder, I’m not sure Raburn wins.  Once they start trimming rosters, it will be interesting to see if Raburn gets some infield work.  With Larish basically on the team, Raburn won’t be playing first or third.  Clete Thomas will have to get some innings in the outfield (either in Toledo or an extended spring training in lakeland) before he factors into the equation.  Or maybe i’m making more of this to myself because I don’t want to think about the starting pitching situation.