NorthWoods

Pretty good article on active players and Hall chances. https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/baseball-hall-of-fame-active-mlb-players-locks-on-track/ Tarik Skubal Skubal won the American League Cy Young in both 2024 and 2025, making him the first repeat AL winner in more than two decades. Coming off his age-28 season, he's set himself up pretty well to possibly win a third Cy Young; every pitcher who has done that so far is either in the Hall of Fame (Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux, Steve Carlton, Pedro Martinez, Jim Palmer, Tom Seaver, Sandy Koufax), is connected to PED (Roger Clemens) or isn't yet eligible for the Hall (Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander). Further, the only pitchers to have won two Cy Youngs before their age-29 season are Clemens, Maddux, Kershaw, Martinez, Seaver, Tim Lincecum, Johan Santana, Bret Saberhagan, Denny McLain and Skubal. With 54 wins, and 889 strikeouts in 766 ⅔ innings, Skubal needs to stockpile a ton more counting stats, but there's plenty of time for that. He's been the best pitcher in the world the last two seasons -- or at least neck-and-neck with the next guy we'll discuss -- and if he keeps that going for four or five more years, he'll be in great shape for the Hall of Fame."

Our biggest weakness remains RF/CF. Clark can't arrive too soon. Or put McGonigle at SS and move Javy back to CF.

You're probably right, just the whole scenario of rooting for a guy that's planning to ditch the team and town is somewhat distasteful. I know it happens in other sports but *usually* you don't know until after the fact.

Thanks and my old man memory showed anyway. I would have sworn it was Le Grand Red, and as someone corrected above it was Le Grand Orange. I mostly remember him as a bright spot on those Tigers powerhouse teams.

lol, sorry. I was teasing and should have been more clear about that.

Agree. If Skubal's 1st choice was to stay in Detroit it seems there would have been at least minimal good faith negotiations Boras or not. The lack of any contact tells me he's mentally out the door, another reason why I think a trade is the best course here.

Le Grand Red was a Wizard at 1B.

Of course the longstanding answer to this concern is the much larger population pool to draw players from. Japan, Korea, Australia, etc, etc, etc. 337: Sorry about the 26 man error up there, I was thinking about the extra roster spot for DH's and making it permanent. Still too stuck on the long time 25 number.

And if Skubal/Skenes gets to those numbers - $2-3M per start is absurd.

Going back to check on the resolution of the 1972 strike and hit this nugget on Wiki, kind of makes for 1967 the year of my 1st heartbreak as a Tigers fan. One major effect of the uneven schedule was that the Detroit Tigers played one more game than the Boston Red Sox, which enabled Detroit (with a record of 86–70) to win the American League East as Boston (with a record of 85–70) finished 1⁄2 game behind.[2]

True enough and I'm old enough to remember the 1972 strike so I've been around for all of them. I just get the sense that there enough owners out there willing to hold out for a cap that it could create an extended standoff. Hard to believe? Yes, but then again I never would have believed the 2 sides would allow an entire post season to be cancelled. On the positive side it would seem that the owners offering 2 expansion franchises with the accompanying additional jobs and maybe a permanent 26 man roster spot might be enough to get to a deal. The strikes in general benefit the top players more than the rank and file, it would seem they would vote their own interests.

That along with the slight probability of no strike next year. My guess is that we're in for a long and bitter strike that will cost many lower paid players their careers and lowered pensions. I'm now all in for trading Skubal for the best pitching centered package we can get, focus on 28 & 29 since '27 is likely to be a mess if a season even happens.

Strategery.....he's playing chess.. And some of us saw '24 coming long before others, I provide evidence from my Twitter account:

He cleared the deadwood so the youngsters could take ownership of the team and thrive.

Trade Skubal for the best haul of young pitching available. Use the $19M to sign more SP.

I like Benetti, can't stand Dirks.