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I went back to remind myself of the prevailing opinion of Franklin Perez in places like Fangraphs, and everyone thought he was going to be a solid top half of the rotation guy, even though he was already hurt. But he just didn’t get any healthier in our system. Take from that what you will …

I do think it’s fairer to say that we can expect Skubal to continue breathing fire every fifth day through the end of the year and then into November, while still saying whether Holliday and Basallo will rake in the majors is still speculative. Burnes has been better than Skubal over the past seven years. That’s a fact. No dispute here. What I am saying is that Skubal is better in 2024, on practically every relevant metric, and that’s also a fact. (Sorry, I couldn’t isolate just those two on iOS screenshot.) Please note that I am not saying that Skubal is the greatest pitcher in history of the world and that Burnes is complete dog shït. Definitely not. They would, without no doubt, be 1-2 in your playoff rotation. I’m just asserting that Skubal would be that #1, and with 15 pitchers in between them on the list above, that it’s not particularly close. Now, in 2018 or 2021, Skubal’s not better. Burnes is. But then, you’re not trying to win in 2018 or 2021. As for the injury thing—you’re right, and he does have 123 innings already on his wing this year, so that would be a legitimate reason to not do the deal, and that’s fine. There is no imperative here to liquidate Skubal. We’d be right chuffed to hang onto him and have him open for us in Los Angeles next March. But injury is a risk with any pitcher you pick up, and I’m not necessarily sold that Skubal is an abnormally higher injury risk than your other options, even with two surgeries on the elbow. But every trade harbors that risk, so caveat to the emptor. But if I am right—if Skubal continues to mow down everyone crossing his path for the next three months—you might sorry to see him to land on one of the teams that runs the O’s out of the tournament. And that’s the risk of not trading for him. All this said: I still put the odds of Skubal going anywhere at something less than 10%, because getting rid of what casual fans have heard is the best pitcher in the league pitching for our team in exchange for a bunch of guys they’ve never heard might be enough to drive those casual fans away from the Tigers for a long, long time. Go Lions!

Not even all that huge, since we apparently just had to give them $40 million as well to entice them to take Verlander off our hands.

OK, so, two things: (1) those numbers are general estimates and not results, which obviously you know; and (2) Holliday and Basallo have still done nothing in the majors and are certainly not guaranteed to, whereas Skubal is Cy Young right now and is ready to lead a playoff rotation right now, even over Corbin Burnes, and not by a little. So yes, the numbers from this trade value thingamabob favor the Tigers' return over that of the Orioles, but the key difference is that the numbers assigned to Skubal are based on current reality, whereas the numbers assigned to the Orioles players are all based on speculation—with good reason, I acknowledge, but still, speculation. And remember, even losing all these players, especially the top two, the Orioles still have their positions covered for years and years, whereas our rotation would be shattered until at least next year, and perhaps beyond. Trading Skubal will definitely hurt the Tigers much more in the short term (perhaps the next 12 months) than the Orioles, and if the Orioles would never trade them under any circumstances, then they are to all appearances just trying to run up the score, same way (sorry for this but) Trump thought he would run up the score by choosing Vance as his VP (again, sorry for that, but I mention it only because of how apt the comparison is.) IOW: if the Orioles would not trade these players, who may not even pan out, for the best pitcher in the game right now, at a time they need him most, in favor of keeping their players around for, I don't know, just in case, I guess? And they won't even have room for these players for years anyway—then just what exactly are they trying to accomplish here? This is a good trade for both teams, and I don't think the Tigers should take any less than this. I personally would bless it, and honestly, I don't think the Orioles would have to think very long about it before they accept it as well.

A couple weeks ago I offered you Skubal and Parker Meadows in exchange for Holliday, Basallo, one of Haskin, Fabian, or Rhodes, and a pitching lottery ticket like Strowd, Gillies, McGough, Hoffman, or Armbruester. I see no reason to move off that now, although I'd be willing to discuss trading off Basallo for a major-league ready arm like Brandon Young. Can somebody run this through baseballtradevalues? I don't subscribe.

She had me at Kamala, but anti-fracking too? 🥰

I wonder how many hard-right wackaloon red-hatted Republicans stayed home in November because of both this and his admonishing the old lady about saying Obama is an Arab.

Catholics elevate the Pope to the status of infallibility, worship and pray to Mary Mother of God, and believe in a redemptive purgatory versus being "saved", so political evangelicals don't believe Catholics are even Christians.

Fair assumption, but still only probably, not absolutely.

I do the research so you don't have to: Javy is not in this table because he is not qualified, but if he were, his 27 OPS+ would place him sixth on the list, behind two Bill Bergens, and immediately ahead of four more Bill Bergens. Notable other qualified hitters with historically awful OPS+s are Neifi Perez (2002 KCR, 51st with a 44 OPS+), Clint Barmes (2006 COL, 69Th with a 47 OPS+), and Chris Davis (2018 BAL, 84th with a 49 OPS+). One other name that leapt out at me was Ozzie Smith, 1979 SDP, who had a 48 OPS+ in 649 PAs, but still had a 1.6 WAR that season. And check out who comes in at #40!

Even were we to sneak into the playoffs, which is far less than 50-50 even now, we're not winning the postseason crapshoot against the Orioles-Yankees-Indians-Dodgers-Phillies-Brewers with a gimpy rotation, a bullpen without a shutdown back end, and a flaky decimated offense made up of inexperienced young guys and stopgap veterans and Javier Baez. Failing to strike while the iron is hot in exchange for a puncher's chance of sneaking into the third playoff shot would be executive malpractice.

@Greg Pappas

I would think it's Fangraphs, which uses a combination of eyeball scouting and physical data and analytics, whereas Pipeline feels like it's a combination of eyeball scouting and physical data and finger in the wind.

I know this frustrates fans to no end, but I like it. It’s a good sign that we are still competitive even when we lose, not a bad sign that we are incapable of winning close games or anything like that,

I really don’t think Jobe is coming up this year under any circumstances. He has only 33 innings above A-ball, he’s not even in Toledo yet, and he’s walking guys like crazy in Erie. Even on the precipice of his 22nd birthday, he’s still not ready.

Man, Royals made it interesting bringing the trying run to the plate, but they still lost 8-6, so, yeah, not a total loss.

Man, you and the tweet are totally burying the lede here.

By the way, the Royals are completely falling apart tonight after a **** call from the home plate umpire on a pitch that would have ended the game on a strike ‘em out-throw ‘em out double play with a 4-3 win. Since then they’ve given up five runs and are now down 8-4. So, see, the night is not a total loss after all.

Good point, I agree. Either way, I don’t think Harris is depending on either Pipeline or Fangraphs. I’m sure they have a very robust system that will give them a better picture about possible returns in trade than are available to us.

Yes, they will definitely do so at the first opportunity. If we trade Skubal and get Holliday, Javy is definitely not coming to Lakeland in February. Even with no trade, it’s still 50/50 at best.

That may have factored into Hinch’s decision to let Javy hit. If he pinch-hits Javy and the PH struck out, all he’s gained is an out anyway and a pissed-off player. Plus, even a manager without a psychology degree is not looking for creative ways to embarrass his players. Hinch can’t always sit Javy and he can’t always pinch-hit him. Sometimes he’s just gotta trust him to do something. Don’t worry, though, the games are low stakes anyway because we’re still rebuilding and so many of our guys are just hurt, so managing to make the playoffs isn’t a prudent way to run a team like ours in our state. Hinch has got to manage to finish the season and help the organization learn as much about what we have so they can go into October knowing what to plan for next season.

Apropos of nothing, It drives me absolutely bonkers whenever I see a zero in front of batting average, on base, slugging, or OPS. It's not 0.997, you dipwads, it's .997. Act like you grew up with baseball, for crying out loud. </rant>

Local blackouts must be in place to protect the local option. Personally, I wouldn't walk into the next room to see most of that network's content. Outside of the occasional decent doc and MLB Now only when Brian Kenny is on, the whole network is seat-of-the-pants boosterism, because they are just too close to the people in it to see it any other way. Most of the ex-players they have on there are just that: guys who knew enough to make the major leagues at one time, but don't know enough about the overall game in general to be interesting or informative.

Since Flaherty is known to return a comp pick to Detroit when he turns down a QO, I think most teams would be inclined to offer the Tigers (value of comp pick) + $1. Although the Dodgers might offer (value of comp pick) + $1,000, because they need pitching this year. As for the Orioles, rich guys can and do pay a lot more, so their #4 and #5 would be fair comp at minimum, even of they're not top 100s.

They would bat Javy 17th if they could get away with it.