But think about it. Partially because of what the Tigers did last year and what the Rays have been doing - the value of Starting Pitchers might not be as high it once was. Starting pitchers are limited more than ever with number of innings and the Tigers proved that you can win without having a dominant rotation. I mean, they had TWO starting pitchers, basically, the last two months of the season.
I don't know, but I think it's better to have depth than height with starting pitchers. Having 4 or 5 good starters and a great bullpen is better than having a dominant ace and then mediocrity. With the one ace you may almost guarantee that 1 out of 5 games, but with depth you can aim towards realistically winning 3 out of every 5. Over 162 games that's a big, big difference. This 10/400 number ain't gonna do it. Not with Steve Cohen in the game. Skubal could get north of 50 million a year or one of these super long deferred-money deals. If the Tigers offer 10/400, Cohen's gonna offer 15/700 or something insane like that. It's all play money to him like it was for Mr. I back in the day. A lot of it will depend on how close the Tigers actually get to winning it all and how well guys like Max Clark, Kevin McGonigle and Jackson Jobe develop.
Right now the Tigers have 1 dominant ace, 2 really good dependable starters, a question mark that may finally be showing he's worth the 1/1 pick and a rookie who doesn't know what he's doing yet, but is still looking pretty good. They are in great shape. If they lose Skubal right now to an injury, they'd still be in the top third of the league in starting rotations and I think that's what they are going to try to build forever here. Build such a solid foundation in all aspects that losing one or even two stars will not slow you down.
Heck, to me their Offensive MVP last year was Parker Meadows. When he finally returned those two months, they were a completely different team (once he figured it out) -- and the fact that he hasn't even played this year and they have the best record in the AL should give us a ton of confidence in the future. Everyone is playing and everyone seems to be contributing, especially now that Sweeney and Keith have started hitting. They just have a hell of a coaching staff and they seem to have an incredibly good development staff. They aren't asking guys to try to do things they aren't good at. They're simply putting them in places where they know they can thrive. The downside of that is other than maybe 2 or 3 players (Greene, Torres, Torkelson), nobody is starting anywhere close to 160 games, but it seems like we're going to have 10 or maybe even 11 guys who play in 120 games. AJ Hinch is playing Chess here. An added bonus to that is every player on that bench needs to be mentally ready because they might get put in the game at any time and I think that just sharpens up EVERYONE.
I am shocked it hasn't happened yet, but I fully expect them to have to put a pitcher in the field of play because they exhausted their bench.