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when DD traded Fister, he said he had a list of 1 guy he had to have and then reached out to 10-15 teams; Nats agreed to include Ray, so trade got done; I don't think it is an exaggeration to say that Al is afraid - terrified really - to make a mistake; every transaction he does is from The Basics of GMing from 1986; conservative, old school; get a handful of guys and hope one works out

When Diego died I missed the day of and the next day. I was given Bereavement Pay for those two days. For a dog. They get it.

There can never be another Vin Scully.

I give the parents and everybody else great credit for simply not hauling off and kicking the shit out of him because I want to do it from way over here.

My worry is it's going to be difficult to get a top flight up and coming GM to come to Detroit with the longstanding indifference the Illitch family has had to International scouting and player development. They don't even own the facility in the Dominican Republic and have arguably committed the least amount of resources of any MLB organization to its international operations. It is hard to win as a small or medium market if you basically ignore 30% of the player pool. If you model the organization after the Rays or a team like that, but with a little more expensive big league payroll, then you have to commit to gaining every advantage you can. It will be hard to recruit anyone good if they don't think that ownership is willing to invest to try to win. In addition to that, hiring a quant GM and completely overhauling player development in the minors and majors to a more new age hitting approach are the other main things I'd like to see change. I had mentioned this on the other site when Hinch's hires were first announced and he hired a lot of really good assistants or well thought of people in player development (like Fetter), but then went totally old school with a failed hitting coach. It's still an odd decision. The swing path of basically every Tigers hitter has been markedly worse this year and Tork's was seemingly changed right after he entered the minors. Another benefit of a quality GM who is up and coming is they would also likely be able to recruit other up and coming staff (due to their connections) to head up player development, beef up the biomechanics department and analytics department, etc. Avila is far removed from that world so anyone he brings in, like a Ryan Garko, is going to be uninspiring.

I'm happy that they didn't trade Joe, I feel like finally 6 years later he is the weapon that we always wanted him to be, and has more value than the junk that we would have received for him.

Oh?

It's all ping pong's fault.

Detroit Tigers (42-63) at Minnesota Twins (54-49)

Harold Castro.... good singles hitter, bad at just about everything else lol

I think he would accept. Time to "clean some things up" as Al said yesterday but forgot to add himself to the cleaning....

Boyd, Fulmer, JV, JD, Castellanos, Upton, Kinsler = Alex Lange

This guy has overvalued his own assets every trade deadline. The deadline is a benchmark to incrementally increase the talent level of your organization every year. He can't read a market and he can't honestly assess his own roster. And he is in constant CYA mode making excuses with his media mouthpieces. Even Lynn has turned on him so it's close to being over. All you need is an honest executive who can tell the owner that they are years away. Then allow him to make trades to really rework the talent level in this organization.

I am going to cautiously go against the flow here and say the minor league development system of late hasn't been that bad. Not saying great...but this year sucks at the pro level, especially given expectation (as did the last xx years), so I think the reflex is to call everything a dumpster fire in the moment. We have been fairly lopsided to bringing in pitching depth the past few years in the draft (and acquisitions)...and I'm not sure one can call the results in this area a failure at this point. Now, I could point to a lot of injuries...but even still, what has managed to somehow stay on the field hasn't been too bad. The bullpen pitchers specifically have had a lot less time on the IL (relatively speaking) and well, pretty good results. When all the results are in someday, even for the SPs, are you comfortable going on the record today saying Skubal, Mize, Manning, Jobe, Madden, Turnbull, Brieske, Flores, Bergner (and the other half dozen lottery tickets we have) are all busts? I dare anyone to go on record and give out a number less than 50 WAR on the group. Now, hitters...yeah...woof. When we have taken them (outside of this year), it's been very high...specifically speaking to Torkelson and Greene (because I don't wanna split hairs on the others endlessly) Tork and Greene's early failures have been spectacular (sidenote: we are pretending hard that Greene is doing well so far...but really, he's been hot garbage too for a supposed 1st overall prospect. .2 WAR for a quarter of a season? ...and dropping fast. Our boy has a serious, Baddoo-sized hole against strong curveballs/higher end breaking stuff..and MLB has figured it out of late. Hopefully his skill level is such that adjustments can be made). However, they are both very recent former #1 prospects..and the adage that hitting (and winning) is contagious, and you have to give young hitters some MLB ABs and experience before you know what you have got is true. Newbs generally suck for a time...regardless of skill level. A good amount of trouble with them is likely a mix of inexperience, pressure...and more significantly we are giving them BAD MLB EXPERIENCE 24/7...watching our legion of underachievers, who are supposed to be major leaguers, be put in the lineup EVERYDAY, and go up there and fail ALL season long (insert Grossman, Candy, Schoop, Baez, all-singles-Miggy, Barnhardt, no-power Meadows,etc)..coming back to the bench and moping around. Every. Frigging. One. Of. Them. (maybe outside of Haase in the past couple weeks). So yeah. Management sucks AL sucks. Hinch is suss. Their pro talent assembly skills, lineup assemby, and cheapness to date is epically bad. There isn't even an excuse...which is why I'm putting Hinch in the 'suss' category now. As an example... let's get Baez, when all our division rivals combined started the year with 1 lefty starter and Baez is a career 730 OPS against righties...that should be fine right? That's worth 23 million! As always, he is over 900 against LHP this year.. too bad he has only gotten 80 abs against lefties. No excuse for this. Batting old man Cabrera 3rd and 4th all year, every game? I mean, I get it...everyone loves the teddy bear and we still have to pay him out...but he weighs 280lbs, is immobile, has nothing left in his legs...has 13 XBH as a full-time DH in more than 350 PAs so far...THIRTEEN! There is no current ballplayer you give 350PAs to over 100 games that could do worse....this dude is our 3/4 in the lineup guy? He should be Pujol'd, AKA he comes out to wave..and get ABs against soft throwing lefties and when the game is out if hand (or a guy on 3rd and 1 out...preferably no one on first at the time). And if he gets a day off...oh, how about no power Harold, or Grossman, or vertigo/covid/bad achilles Meadows pencilled in there? No excuse. The young guys, especially the pitchers, see this nonesense, these non merit/non baseball based decisions being made, and forced failure being put upon them and the team...they sit there and quietly take it. No wonder hopelessness and failure finds them. But I can still excuse, or not find 'that' much fault for those in the org who have been attempting to find talent for the team and who they have assembled. The group of pitchers and players developed and drafted the past 5-6 years are not battle tested yet, they haven't been given their due reps as healthy MLBers on a functional/sound pro club. I'd be petrified to box them all up and ship them to a sound fundamental ballclub, that makes rational decisions at the major league level and see how they turn out...and I think if others were honest with themselves...they would be too. So yeah...I guess I had somethings bottled up. /rant off. /clean house

as you would say....HYPERBOLE. lol. its going to take time to see results from the new scouting and development system installed a few years ago. and prospect rankings are notoriously volatile. that said, gotta pick it up Al. you sold the rebuild and you sold the end of the rebuild. the results from this seem.....poor so far.

Meijer also outspent Gibbs 6:1, I believe. The DCCC strategy piece is something to consider, but at the end of the day, voters are going out and voting for these candidates. For whatever reason, mainstream R operatives (and the press) can't stop letting them off the hook for their choices.

I sure do wish it were a criminal trial. He's definitely one of the most despicable people out there.

many of the young arms, regardless of level, are going to hit their innings limits soon. So come September none of those guys will be pitching in Det

Just cite him for contempt and put him in jail overnight between the trial session.

I think he is a fraud. He was a Republican in 2008 and in 2018 he asked a strategist what he should run as. Since the tide favored Democrats, he ran as a Democrat. He pumped the city of Detroit with ads and a bunch of low information voters voted for him. In true Democrat fashion, the Democrats couldn't consolidate around one candidate. You had about 8 other candidates splitting votes. Now Detroit is going to have no black representation in congress for the first time in about 70 years.

Probably just style or personality, but Dan might be more a product of our times. Subtlety is certainly not in vogue these days.

You only need one of McGruder or CoJo, not both. I'm fine with having some vets, - it's definitely important - but this roster construction is a bit odd right now. I assumed Troy was hanging on to that cap space in order to make a move (maybe trading Olynyk or something) before the season in order to have it make more sense. There are simply too many guys who will be expecting playing time at the Center and Guard spots. Guards: Cade, Ivey, Killian, Hami, Burks, CoJo, McGruder, Lee Forwards: Saddiq, Livers, Knox Centers: Stew, Bagley, Olynyk, Noel, Duren All those guys in red either need minutes because they're getting developed, or need minutes because their careers are still alive and they aren't ready to sit on the end of the bench. And I've been pretty conservative here by not listing CoJo (and maybe McGruder) who you know Casey will give minutes to. Sure, some of those guards can flex up to SF, particularly Hami and Burks. And yes, some of those Centers can flex down to PF (though each will struggle on one end of the floor or the other). But you've got 5 guys whose natural position should be Center in today's NBA, all of whom need or expect minutes. And that's even before we get into the point that moving them down to PF is the opposite of today's "positionless basketball" which is all about Forwards with guard skills who can defend up or down a position. None of these Centers have the "Guard skills" you need them to have to be the answer at PF. Your best archetype for PF is actually Livers or Bey...but that just makes the minutes situation even more of a train wreck when you've just 3 signed three young Center prospects who need hefty minutes and you also have two vets at that position who are still in their core playing years.

Avila has said repeatedly that one of his priorities was finding guys that strike out less and walk more. Like everything else with Al, it's not his objectives, it's his execution.

I understand the pros and cons of each system for the parties but I wouldn't use the word "unfair" to describe the MI process. That makes it sound like there's ethical issues and I don't see that at all. The Republican party let me vote in their primary to nominate their candidate and I picked the worst candidate. That's not an issue of unfairness. It's not optimal for them as I am not going to vote for their November candidate no matter who it is but that's not what they asked of me in August. It's their ballgame and I'm playing by their rules. Casting a ballot is not a legal document declaring who you like the most.

I went and looked and the league average ops for his A ball league this year was a .686 and he was at a .756 while being 2.1 years younger than average. Also he is 30th overall in OPS, not sure if they were younger or older but there were 5 other 19 year olds higher than him.

Pacheco at 19 years of age going to high A ball is impressive. Tigers must think a lot of him.

But what if you are an independent? Do you not get to vote in the primary? To me it's up to the parties to decide how they nominate their candidate. If they want to take the chance for that then that's a risk they willingly take. A closed primary puts you in position to not get a true reflection of the electorate. I don't see anything unfair about it. My job yesterday was to pick who I wanted the nominee to be for a particular party. That was the choice. It wasn't about who I wanted to be governor.

Everybody is pitching to everybody else like they're Ted Williams.

Was it just one graduation? I dont know what Tork's impact to graduation was on FG. Either way, it isn't particularly the fall of the system that bothers me, rankings will fluctuate even for teams percieved to have good farms based on graduations and trades; it's that all these graduations have led to what will likely end up being a 67 win team.

So that is why we had mandatory records preservation training last week...

That is pretty good.

Patsy Baloney has been subpoena by grand jury.

Bunch of promotions down on the farm!

That's a good point. It's impossible to negotiate if you can't even get a conversation going. "We want impact players." "So does everyone else. Develop them yourself." Development of talent has been an issue for this team for a long time.

Parker Meadows and Flores making power moves to advance to the next level...

Nice

They also live in a bubble of lies

Wouldn't short sell the Dodgers on that front tho... they have a ton of money yet are Ray-like in a lot of ways though. Either way, the discussion about bringing home a former great to run the team is beside the point... the team needs a new vision, one from the outside, it doesn't need to look to the past.

We've got the runs tonight!

My fear is that we evolve into something like the Pirates going forward: luck into the occasional impact player from drafting, signings or trades; surround him with AAAA and underachieving-veteran teammates; play ~70-win ball year after year while the impact player matures; trade impact player at the deadline before they can make too-high salaries and receive underwhelming prospects in returns; rinse and repeat ad infinitum. Can you see something like that happening with Riley or TORK!? As long as this regime is in control, I can.

Pitching wasn't their problem this season, it was the entire line-up slumping. And why in the world would we possibly want to get another outfielder? We already need to clear out several from the roster. We have Carpenter coming in too. Just a glut of underperforming or unproven outfielders already.

Joel Zumaya

As others have suggested, Al could get the “promotion” to senior advisor status and a new GM brought in, instead of being actually fired. I could see that happening.

It's amazing that Fulmer realistically could have been moved a couple seasons ago for at least one top 100 prospect and then is finally moved for a random AA starter after Fulmer had a number of injuries and had to shift to the bullpen. That was underwhelming. But, par for the course for Avila and his general asset management. So, not surprising that nothing happened with Skubal, Soto, Lange, etc.

I took on a variation of a process I saw Ralphie do on the show. When you drain the pasta either don’t drain it all the way or leave some water in the pot. Put the. Pasta back in the pot and take a half ladle of sauce and mix it up. Gives the pasta a nice coating and keeps it from sticking. Ralphies process used butter and you heated the pot up and stirred the pasta into it. growing up my mom , who isn’t Italian, would put the pasta into the sauce pan and mix it up. My mother in law said that’s how her best friend Rosie’s family did it. They were “eye-talian”. They stayed friends all these years. When I got my first job out of school I worked about 1/2 mile from their house. I went over there and she did the “Italian woman going to feed a man” thing. “You look skinny? Is your new wife feeding you? Come on. Eat. You need to get strong to make babies”

And all they got was a pitcher with three last names.

This is what bothers me the most about the past few years with the Tigers.... as much as we complain about how much the owner of this club will spend or if he'll want to cheap out in certain instances (all well deserved), teams like the A's, Brewers and Rays always seem to manage to field a competitive club in most years without spending even as much as the Tigers will. And that is because they know how to draft, develop and acquire talent. I've been keeping an open-mind on the new player development hires that have happened in the minor leagues and maybe they will make a difference going forward. And certainly that needs to be accounted for as well as the presence of AJ and his staff, who I would like to see stay on as well. But the reality is that the guy at the top has tried and failed for far too long at this and he needs to go.

Adinso Reyes promoted to Lakeland. I have a feeling this is one of many promotions today.

Barnhart has a .491 OPS and we are in August. Holy shit.