gehringer_2

The only thing with Miguel is that he could still flash a little brilliance now and then. Just to remind you. But it got to be so seldom. Even as late as '22 he could tease a month hitting 320 and being productive, but he couldn't sustain it and soon enough he'd be back to futile.

The other big single event that hurt Ford a LOT was the 'Poland is a free country' slip (not be the exact syntax but is was along that line). That was a pretty serious error at the point were the cold war was still pretty frigid and it wasn't just a misspoken word - there was a thought there but it so muddled and poorly executed it had to make you wonder.

We all do it, but maybe we give Watergate too much credit for the outcome in '76. It was going to be a tough climb for Ford anyway. Carter was the more appealing personality and much better in front of the cameras - stagflation was already setting in. If Ford hadn't carried MI as a favorite son, which another Repub probably would not have, Carter gets 318 EV.

I think they believe Colt is close enough to being a better hitter against RHP than Ibanez that it's worth it to give him the rope. For now I'm OK with that. Ask me again in another week.

according to Tork, the team has a set of things they preach. How can you hold the line if you tell Javy to go ahead and do it his way? Of course to me, having any single approach to hitting for a whole team is a mistake out of the box. Every hitter has different abilities to do different things in the box and likewise different things they will fail at if you ask them to do. If a guy has good pitch recognition but holes in his swing -sure don't swing at what you can't drive - you can afford to get down in the count if you are not so likely to get fooled. If your pitch recognition is not so good but you have some plate coverage, way better to swing at a FB on the outer third for a single at 0-0 or 0-1 and put in in play than take it, let yourself get in a hole and K or roll over on a breaking ball that fools you. You need your hitters in the box doing what they do best and forget everything else. You'd never ask the average hitter to do what Cabrera did, regularly taking FBs to right and breaking balls to the pull side because most guys simply don't have the pitch recognition or strength to do it. We all understand that - but conceptually the same is true for all hitters - they will all reach their optimum with an approach tailored individually to what they can to. The logic argues there are some hitters you shouldn't ask to take pitches, or tell not to swing out of the zone, or whatever it is, because for some hitter that is what they need to do. So to have a team wide approach in some particular direction sets up some hitters to fail. Now in 5 years, when they have only drafted or traded for hitters that already fit the mold of hitters that hit like they like, then they will look brilliant, but they will have to pass on a lot of productive players to get there.

I'd stick with Colt another 10 games or so. He's been getting better results in his last 10 and I'd let it ride to see if it continues. If he holds a 600 OPS, which is where he is in May, that's as much as you could expect from any of the current candidates at Toledo. If he slides back down, pull the trigger.

Time flies when you get old!

That's true, but on the other hand it *should* piss him off if that happens because it says "you and Hinch screwed up a player I paid good money to get for the team and it took another org to fix him." If the org believes the current crew are the geniuses that they are given credit to be (and have demonstrated they are with the pitching!) then there should be no fear Javy will suddenly rebound somewhere else, right?

Melania is no Maureen Dean. (BTW - John and Mo have been married for 52 yrs - props!)

I think he's trying to do what they want him to in his ABs - evidenced that the K's are down - he may even believe in trying to do what they are telling him, he just can't make it work.

At this point I'd release Javy just so he has some shot at saving something of his career somewhere else because there is no hope he turns it around here. It's practically reached the point of cruelty.

It makes perfect sense really. Javy was a guy with great power who made accidental contact. In encouraging him to K less and shorten up, you now have a hitter whose pitch recognition is no better than it ever was but who now no longer can do any damage by accident. The wild approach was actually part of what made Javy functional as a hitter. Take it away and he's left with nothing. It takes a lot of hubris to tell major league hitters to change what got them to the majors, and in as many cases as not, it fails anyway. These guys have spent their whole lives finding a way to hit that worked for them. The odds there is something they've haven't already tried is there, but not that large. The number of times you change a guy for the better is real enough, but shouldn't deceive anyone into thinking it can happen more than very occasionally. And to be frank, the one guy who did find something that helped turn him around (Carpenter) found it outside the Tiger system.

Maybe there is a lession for the Tiger hitting brain trust here that one size does not fit all wrt hitting?

he's no fan of Trump the man, he was/is a fan of Trump as a right side President. He still wants to defend/protect that aspect of the brand and apparently sees them as separable.

Nice to see the trend finally turn. Of course there is still empty space for another million.....

I agree panic moves are always terrible - but the problem is worse than 3 guys. These are current OPS deficits with respect to career: Gio - -120 (granted very small sample - but not off to hot start) McKinstry - -80 Kelly - - 100 Jake - -150 Javy - -150 and this one is not even vs career - it's just compared to his already terrible last season Tork - -70 (but improving) Vierling - -30 and Riley started hot but is now slumping badly - 633 OPS for May. Keith is actually coming around a bit. OPS was 387 in April, 584 so far for May. Bottom line the team is trying to stay afloat with only Canha, Carpenter and Ibanez hitting their career averages and two of those are platoon bats. -- plus Perez. If Tork gets hot that will obviously help, but I need to see more before I believe he is out of the woods.

He's a peacock that has reached a point where no-one is looking, so he's fanning his 'look a me!" feathers.

and appears to be leaking crude oil.

Tiger offense has been terrible for 3 yrs under Hinch and there virtually no sign of improvement or cases of hitters making unexpected progress. It's hard to make a case for this management around the hitting. To me the issue is how to avoid throwing the baby out with the bath water. The same people are running the pitching side very well. Can we get them to delegate to different sub-group who can bring more to the hitting without losing the rest? I really don't know - it's a muddle right now.

IDK - team change coaches mid season all the time when things aren't working. The hitters may be bad, but clearly whatever they are doing isn't helping them much, so try something different. What is there to lose? Look for a guy who has had concrete success somewhere else and give him a shot. The downside is exactly the situation with Harris and esp Hinch. If they are so totally committed to keep doing exactly what they they are doing, there is no point in making a change. If they can bring someone in who gets buy in from Harris and AJ to do it differently then it can make sense.

I don't see there can be much to lose by staring over with a new hitting staff and a different approach. If someone can come in and persuade AJ there are better methods I would not be averse.

If this gets much more desperate, the league offices will be watching for trash-can lids on Tigers purchasing cards statements....

I'm waiting to hear the mic buttons will be on automated timers.

I agree there isn't much they can do now, which is why my critique was more centered on their off-season inaction. Trades are possible even now, though the Tigers would be dealing out of desperation and that's a bad bargaining position to be in. The other it that as a general proposition you can't let yourself be frozen by the chance of a low probability event (Javy making a miracle recovery) occurring that might embarrass you. Anyone who believes in numbers has to suck it up and accept that sometimes a rare event can happen but you will be better off in the long run playing the better odds. I'll agree with you that such an event creates a PR hurdle to overcome, but if you are seriously hardheaded about building a winner that is exactly the kind of 'don't be swayed by the great washed opinion' decision you have to make. The fans will love you once you win. Ilitch would be wasting his money paying a GM who is swayed by fan opinion. And even if Javy were to be rejuvenated somewhere else, it will most likely only happen if he finds something that works for him there that he can't find here, so what skin is it off the Tigers' nose? I don't see any value in tying him down for spite. At his point, unless the Tigers are going to fire the hitting coaching staff and start over, the odds of him improving if they keep him are not good. If he goes somewhere else and lucks into coaching that works for him, the Tigers can't be swayed by that possibility - it's irrelevant to Tiger outcomes. They have to pay him anyway, be happy for the guy and pocket the refund on the ML minimum. 😇 Plus -- think about the joy you enable when McCoskey can report on his success somewhere else....

actually the post didn't say anything about the Tigers, only that it is pretty well accepted around the league that some teams are going to do what they can without spending big and whatever happens is what happens. And to make that specific to the Tigers, the whole push toward excelling at development is aimed at doing exactly that - winning without having to spend big. Of course the problem is that while it's a nice theory, history tell us it is a really hard way to win, not impossible, but spending correlates really well with progress to/through the playoffs. 🤷‍♀️ But those are all long term general considerations. The initial comment about Javy vs empty stands is a narrower situation about the human tendency to refuse to walk away from dead sunk cost. You are paying Javy either way - you can either pay him and have him be a drag on your ball club making it less a draw to fans, or pay him and still move on to a better player and get more fans in the stands with a better team. I would argue the former is the better strategy whether you are committed to being a low payroll team or not. My criticism of the Tigers was not to recognize that last off season when there was still a better chance to do something about it, because there was nothing but romantic thinking behind the idea that Javy would suddenly be better this season.