Tiger Geist

Not enough for a full post, but here are some unorganized thoughts:

–Hot hitting Victor Martinez and the improved-offensive attack of Alex Avila may be running into a collision course during inter-league.  Sitting Avila’s bat and defense may be difficult.

–Jim Leyland won’t go into a playoff run with Sizemore at second.  I agree with Lee’s options on how the Tigers could make a run for either a shortstop or third baseman with Jhonny Peralta’s flexibility, but the more I’ve thought about it, Sizemore’s the odd man out.  He’d have to be on a massive offensive tear for Detroit not to make a move for a veteran at second.  Nothing against Sizemore, but its just not Leyland’s MO to ride a relative rookie if they smell a playoff race.

–Magglio’s DL stint came at the right time.  Now’s the question of how long it’ll take to get healthy.  20% of Detroit’s 2011 payroll is on the DL for essentially the rest of May; Carlos Guillen still appears a ways away.

–Not sure what to make about Jhonny Peralta’s start yet.  But I can see why Detroit was ready to jump on him:  the market for shortstops blows.  Watching the corpse of Miguel Tejada on a nightly basis is depressing.  The discussion around what it would take to lure Jose Reyes away from the Mets sounds like a king’s ransom; it would only make sense if you could sign Reyes immediately to an extension.  However, Detroit actually has both prospects and (finally!) what appears to be some financial flexibility in 2012.  I imagine this is all crazy talk.

–UZR is killing me.  At this point I have no idea who can field and who can’t based on that stat.  Here’s what I can tell on my own:  Austin Jackson can field.  Miguel Tejada cannot.

–It was widely thought that Curtis Granderson would settle into a corner outfielder role as he aged.  He’s certainly hitting like it right now.

–I had totally forgotten about Matt Joyce.  Wow… really?  Matt Joyce is batting .360?