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Anyone?

It might also be a recognition that certain regulars, probably a healthy majority, are better when they play 130-140 games than when they play 150+. That's probably an analytics insight.

I'm in that boat with you, man ...

In fairness to Hinch, Vierling did get most of the starts at 3B starting mid-August. I guess Hinch could be criticized for not knowing he was the best third baseman in camp the moment he walked into Lakeland in February, but I would regard that as harsh. Vierling is a pretty darn good left fielder, too—arguably the best established left fielder on the team—and that's always been his #1 position.

Shame on you for triggering Edman's high-functioning Asperger's. 😉

Seeing how five is below the big league average for starting third basemen and we do not have an established third baseman signed, at least as of yet, I'm going to say over. The more interesting over/under might be, by which date will the Tigers have started their fifth guy at third base? I'm going to say May 1.

One more post on this topic, if you can stand it ... Here are the most starting players by position for any team since 1956: C : 8 (2011 PIT, 1998 NYM, 1960 CHC) 1B: 12 (2023 LAA, 2022 OAK) 2B: 10 (2022 PIT, 2016 SDP) SS: 9 (1987 PIT) 3B: 11 (2022 CIN, 1958 CLE) LF: 15! (2002 CLE) CF: 11 (2012 BOS, 2007 OAK) RF: 14 (2016 SDP) Not only did none of these teams make the playoffs, only two of them finished above .500, and one of those by just a single game. Let the chicken/egg debate commence forthwith! (EDIT: Interesting—when you run a capital C and a colon together and post on this forum, it turns into a smiley face, and you can't stop that!)

Oh, what the hell, here are the remaining positions:

Cal Fryman!

I think if I were to just remove the shortened season, it would be simply a smoothed line running between the two adjacent seasons.

It's the least severe for catcher, as you might expect:

Speaking of Vierling: Good morning ... ... days until pitchers and catchers report.

Had to have been. 😁

The Tigers started nine different players at third base last year. I did a little Excel thing and found that these are all the teams since 1956, the earliest season Fangraphs has data for, that started nine or more guys at third base: Team 3B Starters 2022 CIN 11 1958 CLE 11 2022 SFG 10 2022 LAA 10 2013 NYY 10 1959 CLE 10 1956 BAL 10 2023 DET 9 2022 MIA 9 2022 ARI 9 2021 PIT 9 2021 CIN 9 2018 NYM 9 2017 SFG 9 2015 ATL 9 2014 ARI 9 2006 LAD 9 2003 TBD 9 1997 CIN 9 1969 CLE 9 That's 20 out of 1,766 teams, or a little more than one percent. Eight of those twenty teams have done so since 2021 alone. Starting more guys at third base is a bona fide trend. This chart shows the average number of starting third baseman per team by season since 1956: Fun fact: Only fourteen teams started only one guy at third the entire year. The 1995 Tigers were one of them. Without looking it up, do you remember who?

Do you honestly believe Vierling should have gotten the majority of starts at third last year?

A team in our position, last year especially, needs to give someone enough latitude to learn and get better at a position to see whether they can become a more permanent option there. That’s going to be a matter of weeks, not days. There’s not enough roster depth and 40-man flexibility to put a guy out there, figure he can’t do it after three or four games, then say “you’re done, next up!”, all season long. Nobody has a couple dozen different guys in their system to be able to option them up and down during a season trying to find The One. An organization has maybe half a dozen guys tops they could do that with at any position, not counting guys on big league contracts they play out of position there, and when you hamstring yourself at third base like we did when we let Candelario walk, you have to give the best of a bad lot time to figure out whether they can actually keep the job. In Maton’s case, he apparently had enough tantalizing moments to make the Tigers think yeah, maybe he can do it, but those were interspersed among the many more moments they looked at him and went, yikes. By end of July it was like yeah, this ain’t gonna work, and we didn’t see him there much after that.

I don’t think we’re ever going to stop trolling the waiver wire—especially after the last guy basically ignored it—but our reliance on it will decrease as our major league club becomes more settled. We are definitely not there yet, so I would expect to see a lot of action on it certainly this year, probably next year. It’s always going to be a handy tool to shore up the back end of both your 26 and 40, especially on the mound. But to Tiger337’s point, it’s unlikely we’re going to run eight regulars out there day in and day out. To the degree that was ever a thing, almost nobody is doing that today.

Who did we have in-house last year who would have been a major-league regular at third?

Given baby-naming trends a couple of decades ago, probably half the organizations have both a Colten and a Kolten by now, or will soon. 😉

Anyone want to take a swing at who this hottie from the Golden Age is?

Nick Maton will catch on some place else and put up another couple years. Maybe Asia.

My favorite part is when they say their thing, I hesitate, they look suspiciously at me, things go quiet, and that’s the end of that.

Thanks, man, but I’m out of the game now. 😁