mtutiger

Getting some Kerry C vibes from Justice Bigbie...

It doesn't preclude, per se, but it doesn't guarantee the chips fell as they otherwise did during this past offseason either.

Trust me, I get it from a production standpoint. But balancing the short term fortunes of the team and the long term fortunes of the team are two different things.... as you suggest, injuries have been a factor as well and they will get a couple of players back. Hopefully that will happen. And I would add, regarding your last point, I don't know if it is smart for a front office to manage a team entirely off of pressure from it's fanbase.

It's true. I do think the defensive piece is a huge factor for both Keith and JHM.... it's easy to point at the statline and say "call em up".... but they need to have a position to play at which they are competent. JHM isn't there yet, and I don't know that Keith (setting aside PPI and other considerations) is either from what I understand.

Back to the Candelario discussion lol.... Food for thought: if they resign Candelario, is Zach McKinstry a Tiger today? Do they actually make the Phillies trade which, as bad as Nick Maton was, also did bring back Matt Vierling? Maybe that's a fine outcome, even preferable, YMMV... but they had a small window to make a decision after the 2022 season ended, before any free agency happened, and they made it. And we have to acknowledge that, because of butterfly effect, it could have had impacts on acquisitions that would have happened afterward and that might have not been entirely great either. I'm happy for Candy, but idk, I don't think it's a huge loss....

Not sure if you are referring to the prospects or the veterans down there, but in the case of the prospects, I just wonder if they view them a little more skeptically or are just more cautious than the rest of us appear to want to be. And what data they may have that lead them to that conclusion. In general, Harris takes a lot of flak because he doesn't provide a ton of information to the media or give much to work with... it creates a vacuum that inevitably people in the media/fanbase will backfill. But OTOH, all of that is just noise and it stands to reason there are advantages to being less forward as well.

Yep... they are not in the AL Beast, so as frustrating as they have been, it can turn around going forward

To be honest, I think that is what the 2023 Detroit Tigers are...

And fast forward to today, it's still the fans. Instinctively, I get it, this team hasn't done jack in seven years so the prospect of bringing up Keith and/or Malloy/Meadows is appealing, particularly while the team struggles offensively. But the front office has to think long-term as well... and there are a couple of cases in Greene/Tork that demonstrate how rushing guys doesn't always yield instant results or how it might not always be the best idea.

Relative to the sky high expectations placed upon Greene by this fanbase, its fair to say he didn't live up to them initially

Regarding Colt Keith, one issue I take with the "call 'em up" cries is that there are legitimate questions as to his fielding and ensuring he can play third at this level. And we just lived through this with JHen, who has recently been moved off third. This just seems to get pushed to the wayside whenever his name comes up, the hivemind just looks at the offensive statline and says "doesn't matter, nothing to learn at AAA, call em up"....

Our competition in the division at the moment, the Jerk Sox, lost two of three to the A's as well. So not exactly out of the realm of possibility either

Regarding the "call 'em up" feeding frenzy on social media, amplified no doubt by their ****ty play in this current series, Riley and Spencer (particularly Spencer) seem like good counterpoints to me... they were called up too early, and I think that has played a role in their struggles. Even aside from whether they are truly ready for the jump, I really worry that this feeding frenzy and expectation that the fanbase is putting onto Colt Keith or JH Malloy or Parker Meadows to be saviors is counterproductive.

But he didn't spend it on the right players, so that's as good as not spending in the eyes of many apparently

Why is Michael Fulmer being discussed in this conversation? He would be one of the worst members of this bullpen if he was still here. I get the "old friend" conversations about guys like Candy or Chafin, not Fulmer.

It seems so counterproductive as well... business often works off of references, and I'm not sure that kind of behavior causes people to refer a business to their friends.

Apparently... On one hand, I get that they can't necessarily take you at your word. On the other hand, there's no harm in just taking the L and moving on, which the other lender who lost out did. It's unlikely, but if we were to run into issues going forward, I know which fallback I'm going to and which one I will not.

That should cure some of the Tork Derangement Syndrome on Tigers Twitter lol

I do agree with that. This conversation never seems too nuanced regardless... certainly the tendency to push kids toward college (which was widespread around when I was going through K-12) was misguided, there are good careers in the trades, sometimes better even than ones you can obtain via college. But at the same time, success in this arena shouldn't simply be about pushing kids toward career paths that don't require capital expenditure to further education, it should be about helping kids find a career that align with their strengths as human beings. And I do worry that the increased cost of college education, even at the state level, will further box out kids whose skills do align with, say, engineering or the sciences but who do not necessarily have the means to pay for it all on their own. I just think that gets lost in all of this discussion... ideally you need a mix of kids interested in both trades or higher ed. Not one or the other, which seems to be how a lot of politicians who demagogue against higher ed (who ironically all have Ivy League degrees; think Josh Hawley or JD Vance) seem to argue these days

Exactly. Certainly not oblivious to the arguments about the regressive aspects to the Biden policy announcement. But at the same time, the deeper structural problems with the cost of higher ed seem hard to tackle when the animating issues of our time in Congress, particularly on the GOP side, is culture war crap.

Cubs seem like the best fit to me as well, but I'd be surprised if there was any sort of bidding war for his services... even among some of the teams listed, it's not clear that Jeimer is that significant of an upgrade

I mean, there may have been others... but clearly Washington must have been the best offer.

Are there a lot of contenders who aren't totally solid at third base at the moment?

This is probably a factor as well. Again, happy that Jeimer is having success elsewhere, but he wasn't merely incidental to the failures of 2022 but was a huge part of it. Both through a mix of underperformance and injury. I seem to recall a stretch of games in June or July 2022 where AJ was holding him out of the lineup for a mental break and that he wasn't necessarily an asset to the club off the field as well. We keep looking at this through the lens of the talent on this roster and how, for one year anyway, Candy may have been supplemental. But he holds some responsibility for his level of play in 2022 as well, and I can understand the team not wanting to pay him more than what the market was likely to judge his value at. And with a new brass that values versatility and strike zone discipline, not clear he was even a fit anyway

The market sets the value. And clearly, given how it played out, $7 million would have been an overpay