2025 Detroit Tigers General Discussion Thread

[Motor City Sonics]

14 hours ago, papalawrence said:

Cobb rehab shut down for now. Tick tock, tick tock Clarice.......

I've been saying all season that he'd never pitch for the Tigers.    Wow, what an embarrassing signing.   Very Yzerman-esque.  

[Motor City Sonics]

Beyond The Box Score ranks their 10 worst players and 5 of them played for the Tigers (and I remember four)

#10 Tom Veryzer,  #8 Gary Sutherland,  #4 Tuck Stainback  #3 Danny Meyer and #2 Doug Flynn

In fact, our DP combo in 1975 was Veryzer/Sutherland (wonder why they lost 109 games). 

Two years later was the debut of the greatest DP combo in MLB history 

 

https://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2012/7/9/3139176/worst-players-in-baseball-history

 

What I remember about Danny Meyer is that neck rolling thing he'd do at every at bat.  Does anyone else remember that? 

Veryzer helped me win a bet.  Someone bet me that I didn't know who we traded him to the Indians for.    It was Charlie Spikes.  

Edited 8 hours ago by Motor City Sonics

[Motor City Sonics]

Look at this rookie card.          Never saw Keith without a mustache before

 

[Sports_Freak]

9 hours ago, chasfh said:

Any examples where Harris has done this in the past?

Several. It's not just not always about money, it's his inability to acquire quality players. Sign a dozen and hope a couple pan out. How many games were the Tigers stuck with Nick Maton at 3rd base?

[Edman85]

Lol, "inability to acquire quality players." Were I a coffee drinker, I would have spat it out reading that.

 

[tiger2022]

13 hours ago, SoCalTiger said:

I think there are limits to the spending and Skubul might be 200 million more...250 to 450 or 275 to 475 ? PLUS PITCHERS BREAK. 

There is a 0% chance Skubal resigns with Detroit.

[Tiger337]

1 hour ago, Motor City Sonics said:

Beyond The Box Score ranks their 10 worst players and 5 of them played for the Tigers (and I remember four)

#10 Tom Veryzer,  #8 Gary Sutherland,  #4 Tuck Stainback  #3 Danny Meyer and #2 Doug Flynn

In fact, our DP combo in 1975 was Veryzer/Sutherland (wonder why they lost 109 games). 

Two years later was the debut of the greatest DP combo in MLB history 

 

https://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2012/7/9/3139176/worst-players-in-baseball-history

 

What I remember about Danny Meyer is that neck rolling thing he'd do at every at bat.  Does anyone else remember that? 

Veryzer helped me win a bet.  Someone bet me that I didn't know who we traded him to the Indians for.    It was Charlie Spikes.  

Ed Romero played one year for the Tigers.  

I know it's just a fun list, but I think some of thosre guys might have been better fielders than their metrics suggested.  There were a lot of utility players on the list and I have always suspected the metrics don't work well for them because they had small sample sizes at every position, so your combining a bunch of unstable numbers together.  For example, I remember Flynn and Romero were regarded as good and versatile fielders, but who knows? 

I can confirm that Tom Veryzer did indeed suck though.  

I do remember Meyer's neck roll.  

[tiger2022]

A non-Tiger, but he had the greatest season ever.  Johnnie LeMaster, 1985.  He slashed .128/.180/.160 for the season over 45 games and played for 3 mlb teams that season.  Pittsburgh 57-104, Cleveland 60-102, and San Francisco 62-100.

Played for 3 teams that lost 100 games that season.

[Sports_Freak]

2 hours ago, Edman85 said:

Lol, "inability to acquire quality players." Were I a coffee drinker, I would have spat it out reading that.

 

Looking at the top players on the current team, most of them were drafted or acquired by Al Avila. How many saves did Shelby Miller blow last season? Seven? The Tigers finished 6 games out. How about Maeda? Cobb? And there are probably several more. Harris did acquire McKinstry, but like i said, bring in a dozen players and hope a few will stick. His trades have never amounted to much, his strength is in drafting and developing.

[Klondike]

3 hours ago, Motor City Sonics said:

Look at this rookie card.          Never saw Keith without a mustache before

 

Tommy Veryzer is the only middle infielder with a potbelly

[Shinzaki]

Hernandez had a coke belly

[chasfh]

3 hours ago, Sports_Freak said:

Several. It's not just not always about money, it's his inability to acquire quality players. Sign a dozen and hope a couple pan out. How many games were the Tigers stuck with Nick Maton at 3rd base?

I thought you were talking about the pridefulness of signing veterans to high dollar contracts and forcing them onto the field to save face for themselves, running them out there time after time when it is beyond any doubt they are absolutely done. I don't know of any instances where Harris has done this. The only one I can think of is Miguel Cabrera, which I'm sure you'll agree is a special case.

I see the Nick Maton thing as being different because (1) he was young enough to give him a fair number of chances to turn things around, and (2) we were just coming off the Al Avila Reign of Error so we did not have anyone better we could replace him with so readily. Also, we tried Maton at third base for 53 games. That doesn't seem like an inordinate amount of games to try him there to see if they could unlock the potential they saw.

Edited 4 hours ago by chasfh

[Sports_Freak]

2 minutes ago, chasfh said:

I thought you were talking about the pridefulness of signing veterans to high dollar contracts and forcing them onto the field to save face for themselves. I don't know of any instances where Harris has done this.

I see the Nick Maton thing as being different because (1) he was young enough to give him a fair number of chances to turn things around, and (2) we were just coming off the Al Avila Reign of Error so we did not have anyone better we could replace him with so readily. Also, we tried Maton at third base for 53 games. That doesn't seem like an inordinate amount of games to try him there to see if they could unlock the potential they saw.

Really? I guess it depends what you consider high dollar contracts. There were a few pitchers signed the last 2 season for what I consider high dollars that were here just long enough to be totally ineffective....Just off the top of my head, we had Maeda, Shelby Miller and John Brebbia. I'm sure if I looked further, there would be a few more. Like I said, sign a dozen players and hope a few stick. Was his best signing Torres? At a position that wasn't an obvious need? And was his signing just something that fell in his lap? It seemed strange at the time, considering we just signed Keith to a long term contract last year and the fact we had 3 other players who could fill in at 2nd base. 

You know, I get it. The Tigers are a business and they're apparently making money. That's the goal of any business. Winning is nice but in the long run, making money is the goal. And since players contracts are overhead, keeping costs down is a good business decision. 

[1776]

26 minutes ago, chasfh said:

I see the Nick Maton thing as being different because (1) he was young enough to give him a fair number of chances to turn things around, and (2) we were just coming off the Al Avila Reign of Error so we did not have anyone better we could replace him with so readily. Also, we tried Maton at third base for 53 games. That doesn't seem like an inordinate amount of games to try him there to see if they could unlock the potential they saw.

Too, the trade that brought Maton over  was part of a five player trade. It’s not as if Harris whiffed on a center piece for the future. If you look at the trade several years removed, Matt Vierling made the trade worth it. 

[kdog]

It's been 11 years...they will close out the division by Sept 20th so it's a nice accomplishment.

 

 

[chasfh]

1 hour ago, Sports_Freak said:

Really? I guess it depends what you consider high dollar contracts. There were a few pitchers signed the last 2 season for what I consider high dollars that were here just long enough to be totally ineffective....Just off the top of my head, we had Maeda, Shelby Miller and John Brebbia. I'm sure if I looked further, there would be a few more. Like I said, sign a dozen players and hope a few stick. Was his best signing Torres? At a position that wasn't an obvious need? And was his signing just something that fell in his lap? It seemed strange at the time, considering we just signed Keith to a long term contract last year and the fact we had 3 other players who could fill in at 2nd base. 

You know, I get it. The Tigers are a business and they're apparently making money. That's the goal of any business. Winning is nice but in the long run, making money is the goal. And since players contracts are overhead, keeping costs down is a good business decision. 

Maeda had a bunch of decent to good starts all the way into June last year. Once it became clear in July he didn't have it anymore, he was pushed to the bullpen to fill in with garbage time, basically out of harm's way. He got one more month this year to see whether he could turn it around. he couldn't and got let go. That seems pretty reasonable to me.

Shelby Miller went from July 1 to the end of last season with a 3.03 ERA, 3.67 FIP, only two blown saves, and a 24/6 K/BB ratio in his last 29+ innings. That doesn't sound ineffective to me.

Brebbia started out good this year, first nine appearances with a 1.00 ERA, 9/5 K/BB ratio, 3.67 FIP, no blown saves. He got hurt and then was given his chances to turn it around. After a month when it became apparent he'd lost it, he was released. That seems pretty reasonable.

In none of these cases does it seem to me that Harris irrationally kept running pitching out there hoping against hope he could save face on their signings while refusing to acknowledge they were failing. There must be some other guy you're thinking of that did that.

[Edman85]

2 hours ago, Sports_Freak said:

You know, I get it. The Tigers are a business and they're apparently making money. That's the goal of any business. Winning is nice but in the long run, making money is the goal. And since players contracts are overhead, keeping costs down is a good business decision. 

They are winning and making money. I guess they haven't met the third goal of making an anonymous irrational fan happy, so they have failed.

[Sports_Freak]

1 hour ago, chasfh said:

Maeda had a bunch of decent to good starts all the way into June last year. Once it became clear in July he didn't have it anymore, he was pushed to the bullpen to fill in with garbage time, basically out of harm's way. He got one more month this year to see whether he could turn it around. he couldn't and got let go. That seems pretty reasonable to me.

Shelby Miller went from July 1 to the end of last season with a 3.03 ERA, 3.67 FIP, only two blown saves, and a 24/6 K/BB ratio in his last 29+ innings. That doesn't sound ineffective to me.

Brebbia started out good this year, first nine appearances with a 1.00 ERA, 9/5 K/BB ratio, 3.67 FIP, no blown saves. He got hurt and then was given his chances to turn it around. After a month when it became apparent he'd lost it, he was released. That seems pretty reasonable.

In none of these cases does it seem to me that Harris irrationally kept running pitching out there hoping against hope he could save face on their signings while refusing to acknowledge they were failing. There must be some other guy you're thinking of that did that.

He hasn't signed any top tier free agents or made any trades to bring top talent here. I acknowledge that he has certain strengths but I also won't turn a blind eye to his weaknesses. It may be orders from above, none of us know, but trades and free agent signings have been a weakness. Quality players were traded at the deadline without teams giving up their top prospects. The Tigers got leftovers...

[Sports_Freak]

17 minutes ago, Edman85 said:

They are winning and making money. I guess they haven't met the third goal of making an anonymous irrational fan happy, so they have failed.

If you think I'm the only fan who wasnt/isnt happy with the Tigers hanging onto 7 2nd base prospects instead of bringing in some established quality players,you're mistaken. The players they could have targeted may have been expensive. And I would venture a guess that was the main reason. Heck, we got a Minnesota pitcher with, what, a career 5.00 ERA? And a 41 year old pitcher who was pretty good...5 years ago? And Washington's closer, who seems to be doing a really good job. Bring in enough players and eventually one will pan out.

[Sports_Freak]

Just to clarify to the people defending Harris;

[Edman85]

How's Helsey doing with the Mets? I haven't checked.

[Edman85]

Actually, that's a lie. I have checked. I kinda want you to before holding him up as a mistake on the Tigers part for not overpaying.

[chasfh]

25 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

He hasn't signed any top tier free agents or made any trades to bring top talent here. I acknowledge that he has certain strengths but I also won't turn a blind eye to his weaknesses. It may be orders from above, none of us know, but trades and free agent signings have been a weakness. Quality players were traded at the deadline without teams giving up their top prospects. The Tigers got leftovers...

By definition, top tier free agents have agency. A lot of them didn't haven't wanted to come here, and some may still be prejudiced against the Tigers because of perception issues. Harris offered the most money to Bregman, and the guy still turned us down and went someplace else. When that happens, what're ya gonna do.

But, also, if Harris thought we were not yet in the right position to blow our wad on a player asking for 10/500 or whatever top tier players command, or to liquidate the top of our system for proven veterans Dave Dombrowski-style, then I would agree with him on that.

And yet, for all of Harris's perceived deficiencies, he has built a roster that has the best record in the American League. Speaking only for myself, I am happy with that.