mtutiger

The first guy who hugged him in the dugout today after his outing was Gabe Ribas... who was hired by Al.

Here's another doozy, granted from a lurker... But yeah, I'm just full of it when I suggest that Tigers fans by and large didnt think the trade was fair value lol

I could go on but, by and large, nobody expected this kid to succeed... and hardly anybody thought the trade at the moment was fair value.

Let's refresh our memory...

Would you not agree that there was a lot of anger and resentment at the end of the last deadline based on the returns?

Sure, he should have traded Fulmer a lot earlier. No argument there. But there was a collective freak out (myself included) when all the last deadline yielded was Fulmer for unranked Sawyer Gipson-Long. It appears that Gipson-Long, in fact, may have been fairer value than we all thought.

The reaction to the trade suggested that it was an example of how terrible Avila was that he didn't get more for Fulmer's services.

Thus far I've resisted the whole "maybe Al wasn't that bad"... thing. But I do think the collective freak out when Michael Fulmer only returned unranked Sawyer Gipson-Long makes one think...

Man, I remember when we all hated this trade...

Reese Olson sure does love pitching against the White Sox....

I remember thinking that, given the start he had, if he finished with a topline .750 OPS that would be a win... that may have been conservative!

They have some work to do, but I do think being "AL Central" competitive is at least achievable as a best case scenario depending on how the offseason goes.... after how last year went, I'll consider that progress

I do think the sentiment in the highlighted should be reflected on a bit - not that I see the insinuation a ton here, but in the broader Tiger dialogue online it is sometimes insinuated that there's a bunch of daylight between Harris and Hinch on some of these personnel decisions, whether it's Candy or how certain players aren't getting called up quickly enough or that Hinch has used certain players more than he should to prove some sort of point to Harris (Maton is the best example here - as galaxy brain as it sounds, our old buddy Sportz has made this claim a few times this season). And there just isn't any evidence whatsoever to back it up the idea that there's any meaningful daylight between the two at this point, just pure vibes. It's almost like, for whatever reason, people project their own thoughts or emotions onto Hinch despite any lack of evidence that he thinks any of this stuff. I suppose it stems from the inferiority complex our fanbase has that someone who won a WS as a manager ended up managing this ballclub (particularly at the juncture he took the job), I don't know, but it's strange regardless.

I do think this is 100% right. Harris wears it because he's the PBO and it is his job, but Hinch had to manage Candy in 2022 and there were times in 2022 where it was pretty apparent he was being held out of the lineup and that he was a source of frustration for Hinch and the rest of the coaching staff. That all tends to get memory holed whenever this comes up: Candy wasn't just incidental to the failures of 2022, he was a feature of it. The Harris team didn't get it done in replacing him, but the decision to move on in and of itself may have been the best thing for all parties involved... I tend to believe that Candy did need a change of scenery.

It's not even that I support management more, just feel like, realistically, thereby be more variables at play in any of these situations than we currently have as fans. Everybody "fans" differently... doesn't make it better or worse or anything.

Believe it or not, I'm skeptical too. But there really isn't an alternative, is there? From the spot the Tigers started in this time last year, there really weren't a ton of shortcuts that existed to make them big time contenders within a 12 or perhaps even 24 month time frame? On that score, seeing where they are at 12 months later, it's hard not to be pleased with where they currently sit. It will take more time, but they appear to be on the right track.

Sure, and barring some sort of miracle, this is year 7 in a row of being under .500. People aren't going to happy until it is fixed. Hard not to sympathize but, as you suggest, it doesn't happen overnight.

Whats weird about this Avila tangent to me is that it's not like they fired him after 1 year (ie. Scott Harris' current tenure)... they gave him 6 years. He got plenty of rope and, while he did do some good things (and some of us have even said as much despite push back!), literally no one can argue that he didn't get a fair shot with this org. Meanwhile, Harris is about a year in and a lot of the outward facing presences in this fanbase already seems done with him. Despite the team beating expectations so far and the farm system, by all accounts, experiencing a significant uptick. I dont get it, but it is what it is.

I can tell you right now that if, for instance, the ERod thing had happened on Avila's watch, I probably would have had the same reaction. And I feel the record, much of it spent being lumped on with the hardcore Avila slappies, would back that up. Perhaps some of us just aren't hung up on "blame" more than trying to assess what actually happened, I don't know. I can't speak for others, but that's how I tried to approach the Avila era, and that is how I am trying to approach Harris.

I'm sure that impacts the Tigers calculations when considering a call up.

Yeah, I think there's a middle area between the bargain bin offseason of 2022 and the shopping at the top of the market type of free agency experience that you see teams closer to contention generally occupy, and that's probably where the Tigers will be this offseason IMO.

Was at the game today, that Tork bomb was absolutely majestic... what a tank!

This is reasonable to me.

Feel free to question him all you want. It doesn't mean we're all obliged to agree with you in every case. I'd suggest your position on this is the majority one as well and the rest of us are the ones pushing back on the conventional wisdom that Scott Harris is 100% to blame for how everything went down wrt ERod.

Rodriguez held the no-trade clause, so he had the leverage. And it doesn't matter what org he was in at the time both executives had to negotiate that gulf. It is what it is. I dont have understand why Al Avila matters when discussing what actually happened in the ERod situation. Other than it was Al Avila who signed him to the deal that gave him Uber amounts of leverage and likely made it harder to trade him anyway