mtutiger

The fact that they have the option of carrying 14 pitchers in May may give them a little more flexibility if they needed to swap Castro for Wentz or Faedo, perhaps. But that wouldn't be ideal for as a long term solution, maybe for 1-2 starts at a time.

I kinda feel bad for Garneau, but the experiment did need to end. Alexander.... umm, yikes. And are they gonna cover him with Peralta?

Haha! Timken is probably the biggest drag on Dolan at this point.... she was supposed to be the mainstream option (endorsed by Portman), but she instead tried the "outcrazy the crazy" strategy, which worked about as well as one would expect. A loss for Vance, considering how Trump weighed in so heavily, would provide (yet another) opportunity for Republicans to reconsider the degree to which his influence matters (which they will not avail themselves of)

Big surge for the not-insane Republican candidate (Dolan) in Ohio.... would be something if he pulled it off

The idea in my mind is that he's a bench player who provides better defense than either Castro at the positions that he can play. It just seems to me that Akil needs reps and, even if Grossman were on IL, it's not clear that he's gonna get more of them in Detroit. Or whether it or not it would be more beneficial for him to get some in Toledo. EDIT: I would also add that Stavenhagen made a good point on his Podcast about the catching situation; and the reality is that if the Tigers weren't carrying three catchers right now, it's not hard to envision that one of Zack Short or Kody Clemens could be on the roster right now.

The real downside to Clemens being in the Harold role is SS.... he's had reps all around the infield except at that position, which means that if Baez needs a day off or anything, you're still stuck with Harold there. This also assumes Willi still gets sent down for roster reduction purposes. Either way, with Schoop / Candy batting as they are, it would be nice to have an alternative to being stuck with Harold having to cover all these positions. I doubt Clemens is a game changer or anything, but it'd be nice to just seem them try something different...

If they really wanted to be bold, if Robbie goes on IL, they could promote both Cameron and Clemens and send Baddoo down for a bit, who clearly needs it. Not that the alternative AAA options are better, but now wouldn't be a bad time for a roster shakeup. And it would be nice to have a non-Castro option who could play 2nd or 3rd.

Campos, Pacheco and Sequera are the others to look at in Lakeland it seems. The concerns / doubts about Dingler's ceiling are fair, but the flip side of that is that it might still turn around given how small a sample size this season has been. Using a example from the big club, granted less plate appearances, but Tucker Barnhart went from batting .167 to .317 and an OPS of .514 to 757 in about one week's time. Obviously can't depend on a hot streak like that all the time, (or perhaps the BABIP luck), but there's still a lot of time to raise those numbers. The other question is what Dingler's ceiling needs to be in order for him to be a successful catching prospect - is it becoming another Joey Bart? Is it simply getting to the big leagues and being starter level? It can be a harder position to judge success because it's an offensive position on the field, yet the value is derived much more heavily on defense and the skill of being able to call a ballgame. If you look around the league, there's a reason catcher's generally aren't the best hitters on the field and are batting lower in the lineup.

Let's check in on Buck Farmer... https://v.redd.it/ojxh1djz7xw81

He looks more The Living Daylights than Octopussy imo lol

Tomorrow is roster reduction day. My guess is Willi and Will Vest get sent down (the latter only because he has options and Hutchison doesnt). But who knows.

I went a few times back in 2010 when I was out there for five months and couldn't believe how hard it was getting into and out of that place. It's a fantastic ballpark, maybe my favorite tbh, but I just remember that you have to really put in effort to get to that place

Wonder what (if any) impacts that has on roster decisions between now and Tuesday

Actually checked on this, but the 100-win Tampa Bay Rays had a seven game losing streak at one point last year (6/15 thru 6/22). Of course teams have to offset it with big win streaks, but it can happen to the top teams as well.

Who knows, maybe they'll be around .500 when he gets back

And Jeimer hit one of them. If they can get even one of those guys off the schneid, they are gonna win more games

Man, it takes WORK to walk Javy Baez

Jeimer!

Meanwhile, Kody Clemens and Zack Short appear to be begging to be called up... at least based on their play.

The failure of this road trip was kinda sealed in Minneapolis. They had to walk away from there with at least a couple of wins. Certainly the first game considering they had the lead. And they didn't Winning more than one game against the best team in baseball on the road wasn't gonna happen. As well as they did play last night, you cannot depend on that happening every time you face a CY candidate. Hopefully they go and take it out on the Bucs at home.

Did not have Singuel being the one to break the homer drought lol!

It's also a sport where the even the best teams still lose around 33% of the time. Just a much different animal than the NFL.