SeattleMike

26 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

Hard to figure what to make of Olsen. Looked great for three innings, then bam. I thought a part of it was bad sequencing though   - too many sliders. I think teams/pitchers can get too hung up on spin rate. Spin is good because it make one pitch act differently than another, but it doesn't matter how good the break on your breaking ball is if you throw it so much the hitter can ignore the FB and sit on it - no matter how you spin it he will figure out where it is going to go if you give him enough chance to.  

I agree with many that the Tigers desperately need to add two starting pitchers this off-season, one if they extend Erod.

1 minute ago, Motor City Sonics said:

This team has 5 very solid starting position players with Greene, Torkelson, Carpenter, Vierling and Rogers.      They need a big upgrade at SS and Colt Keith to either stick at third or second.     A bench with Parker, Baddoo, McKinstry and Backup Catcher Guy ain't too shabby.   

I really hope Baez opts out.   

If Baez could just get back to being a 95-100 OPS+ hitter he would be a 2-3 WAR player, assuming his defense stays strong. Maybe they can figure something out with him during the off-season. 

36 minutes ago, LongLiveMaroth said:

 

Or...once Miggy retires none of this will matter.

3 hours ago, romad1 said:

7 games under .500 at home and only 3 games under .500 on the road.   What the hell is up with that?  The next ten games are at home.   Fix that. 

Check Tork's splits.

Just now, Tigermojo said:

Season series wins against Minnesota and Cleveland!

 

A game over .500 since the All-Star break, almost entirely on the backs of Greene, Tork, and Carpenter, and to a lesser extent Badoo (at least on offense). Easy upgrade to offense next year will be to get some power from the DH position (Malloy?). 

34 minutes ago, Tenacious D said:

I don’t fault him for the dropped ball—looks like he was struggling with the sun out there.

I think the Carpenter is bad at defense stuff is overblown. Many defensive metrics rank him as decent. Yes, he's a had a few muffs at the wall, although today it was the sun more than anything. 

3 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

We were wondering which catcher the Tigers were going to get in the off-season.  They got him already!  I was thinking the other day that the Tigers might get him when Arizone DFA him, but I lost interest when I saw his recent numbers.  Kelly was good in '19 and '21, but has not done anything since then.  He is younger that Haase and probably has a better chance of lucking into a decent offensive season next year.  

Last month he has a 791 OPS, granted in only 34 PA. 

11 minutes ago, Tigeraholic1 said:

112 wRC+ since May 1. BTW, both Greene and Carpenter in top 20 in MLB since then. I believe both were injured during the 9-game losing streak. 

2 minutes ago, Dave Christian said:

Tork bomb!!!

Greene with two hits, Carpenter with a HR, and Tork 3-3 with HR. A win would be gravy. 

1 hour ago, gehringer_2 said:

The Tigers are one game under 500 in games Riley played, 10 under in the games he didn't and probably no accident their worst losing streak came when he was out. It doesn't take that many good players to make a difference. We have a couple of promising position players in the system that could help next season (for a change) and the BP is OK, but I think even with Mize returning, you have assume they lose ERod so they are going to need to sign at least one and maybe two Lorenzen level starters in the off season if they are going to get above 500. Or maybe Olsen becomes a beast.

I agree on the pitching. They need to extend Erod or replace him with an equivalent talent and add another starting pitcher. The 2024 free agent class of pitchers is much better than position players and the Tigers payroll will be near the bottom of the league. No reason not to be aggressive in roster upgrades this offseason. 

3 hours ago, RatkoVarda said:

C - NEED TO ACQUIRE; Jake

1B - Tork

2B - NEED TO ACQUIRE; McKinstry or Maton

SS - Baez

3B - Keith; Ibanez or Short or Kreidler

LF/DH - Carpenter; Malloy or Baddoo

CF - Greene; NEED?

RF - Meadows; Vierling

If Harris can fill C, 2B, and maybe another OF, with a little growth and a little luck, no reason they cannot be .500ish, and in the ALC that's all you need. Hard to believe he again ignores improving ML lineup this winter.

They have basically been a .500 team since starting 2-9 so playing .500 ball next year, with the right roster moves, seems within reach. 

10 minutes ago, alex said:

He was fairly well touted for a good minute at an early age in a loaded LAD system. If he can improve his D a bit - he was always seen as an offensive prospect with some pop and decent speed, BTW 22 at AAA is still young!

Yes I was emphasizing his youth by listing his age

19 minutes ago, RandyMarsh said:

Eddys Leonard goes deep for his first HR with the Tigers down in Toledo, now sporting a cool 1.175 OPS in the 4 games since the acquisition. 

He’s only 22 and has had some success at the plate in the minors. Considering he was acquired for cash not a bad flyer. 

1 hour ago, Jim Cowan said:

Justice Bigbie is an R/R guy who poses lefthanded for his publicity photo.

I was just about to post the same thing. Weird

3 hours ago, Shinzaki said:

He traded for a HOF player in Miggy..that really skews his value returned  🙂

And yet there were many on message boards and in the media (Lynn Henning) who complained that the Tigers had mortgaged their future with this trade. I guess the fear was that Miggy wouldn't sign a long term deal. 

35 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

Momentum is as good as your starting pitcher.

Wasn't that a Jim Leyland saying?

32 minutes ago, RandyMarsh said:

I've already given up on Manning as being anything more than a serviceable number 4. He'll string together a few good starts in a row here and there to give you hope but ultimately revert right back to the player he truly is which is a mid 4s type pitcher.

BTW that's not necessarily a bad thing, there's some value to being roughly league average and giving you 5-6 innings a start but any hope of him being an All Star caliber pitcher like we envisioned at one point is long gone in my eyes. 

Every rotation needs a Porcello. Let's hope Manning can be at least as good as Porcello was.

28 minutes ago, RandyMarsh said:

Meadows turns on a 97mph fastball for another bomb! 

Time to give him his shot. He’s 23 not 21. Been raking for 2 plus months. Is this decision being determined entirely by MLB housekeeping rules?

29 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

Bigbie 2/4 today. He now has almost the same number of AB in AA as in A, and his average is higher, HRs are higher, OBP is higher, Ks are lower. Not much else you can ask a guy to do.  I would think that should be a ticket to the next level

Who knows if Bigbie will pan out, but is this further evidence that the complete overhaul of the developmental staff is yielding positive results? Carpenter last year. Bigbie this year. Meadows huge strides. Perez to a lesser extent. Plenty of busts but that is the nature of the business. I just don’t remember over a two-year period so many guys in the Tigers system making significant strides. Probably just brings us to the middle of the pack in terms of development successes but that’s progress. 

5 minutes ago, Tenacious D said:

If he can play adequate defense there, you could see how the pieces potentially fall in place for next season:

Vierling 3B

Malloy RF

Greene LF

Meadows CF

Keith 2B

I think we know the other positions.  Of course, this assumes no external additions, which is unlikely.

If that is how it plays out, a big if, that would be a very young starting lineup. Assuming Carpenter, Baez, Tork, and Rogers round out the starting 9 that is an average age of 25.6. More growing pains. 

1 minute ago, gehringer_2 said:

four was probably too many. I thought the earlier players game with Jones, Monroe and Petry actually went better than the average Monroe/Shepherd game, though that's a pretty low bar.

Thank god the mlb app allows you to switch to the radio feed. And this year it's synched up pretty well. Apple TV offers the same, which I discovered yesterday thanks to a tip on here. Too bad you guys in blackout zone don't have that option. 

1 hour ago, LongLiveMaroth said:

Fun fact! You can change the audio so you can listen to Dan and watch on Apple TV. Also for those other prospect hounds Jobe is pitching tonight and the WM game is free to watch. 

Thanks for heads up. Been listening to Dickerson on mlb app but difficult to synch. 

37 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

Stacked with pitching? How many of those will make it through the end of next year without getting hurt? They seem to do a good job with pitchers but their overall run prevention is still 21st in MLB.   

I would also like to see them concentrate on position players, but the free agent market looker thinner in that area this off-season.  So, their best effort to try to be more competive next season is to add a pitcher. 

Is LOB% skill or luck? The Tigers are top 10 in WHIP. Top 5 in walks, average in K/9,  top half in hits allowed, average in HRs allowed. Every other team ranked in the top 10 in WHIP is among the league leaders in fewest runs allowed per game. By most metrics the Tigers defense is decent. In some really good, in others ok. The one metric where they really stink is in allowing men on base to score. They are 29th in LOB%. This says to me they been pretty unlucky. 

2 hours ago, Tiger337 said:

That sounds like bull**** that management people say all the time.  I am hoping they are better at it than the previous administration, but I think those are the kind of things that all management people want.  They'll make exceptions if a **** like Doyle Alexander is unbeatable for two months.  

One of the things I liked about Leyland. He always called BS on chemistry. I think the only real intangible he believed in was professionalism. 

25 minutes ago, holygoat said:

Same, which is why I wouldn't offer him an extension. If he stays we have a solid lefty starter for four more years, and if he opts out we have money to play with. 

Yeah, there is more good pitching than hitting in this year's free agent class so replacing ERod with someone comparable or better is very doable.