Will Tigers Pony up for Skubal

[Shelton]

33 minutes ago, oblong said:

what's the ****ing difference between when a team wins or loses their games?  They went 3-13 down the stretch in 2025.   A baseball team going 3-13 is not unheard of.  They went 5-13 in May of 2024.  One season is great, the other is horrible?  That makes no logical sense and just speaks to the ignorant sports talk show mentality.  

If fans were told prior to each of the '24 and '25 seasosn they would win 86 and 87 game, the fans would have been ok with that.  

 

 

Baseball feels uniquely situated to rarely provide satisfaction to a certain subset of fans. If you win 90 games, that’s basically going 9-7 over every 16 game stretch if you tried to flatten it out. Talk radio will call that basically .500. Never getting into a rhythm. 
 

If you get off to a quick start and get 18 games above .500 after two months, then play .500, talk radio will complain about being a .500 team since June 1. Why didn’t they do more at the deadline?

Start off slow and then come back? They won in spite of management. Imagine how they good they could have been if they hadn’t thrown away the first two months. 

 

[Shelton]

Scott Harris’s deadline moves were so bad last year that he caused them to lose 12 games in August. They won 16 games in August just to spite him. 

[casimir]

11 minutes ago, Shelton said:

Scott Harris’s deadline moves were so bad last year that he caused them to lose 12 games in August. They won 16 games in August just to spite him. 

Why only August?  Why not September?

[chasfh]

12 hours ago, Tenacious D said:

I would argue the Tigers achieved that in spite of Harris. He literally surrendered the rest of the season by selling. (Which I agreed with at the time).  Let’s not turn that into something heroic.

So, blame Harris 100% for the collapse and give zero credit for the comeback? Got it. Hey, people agree with you.

[oblong]

1 minute ago, chasfh said:

So, blame Harris 100% for the collapse and give zero credit for the comeback? Got it. Hey, people agree with you.

he's just a college boy more concerned about his haircut and quarter zips than baseball.  

[chasfh]

2 hours ago, Sports_Freak said:

Are you trying to give Harris credit for this? Do you also want to assign him the blame for the historic collapse of 2025?

Personally, I think the players should get more of the credit in 2024 and more of the blame in 2025 than anyone here has been giving them for either.

[chasfh]

19 hours ago, buddha said:

i think harris deserves credit for that.

but i dont think he's blameless with what happened last year.  his trade deadline acquisitions - something he has direct control over - were terrible.  they contributed to losing.  thus, he deserves blame for last year's historic collapse.  probably more than he deserves credit for the prior year's amazing end of season run.

your original post gives the impression that you dont think harris has done anything that has affected the team negatively on the field.  if that is your assertion, i disagree.  but i might be reading too much into your post.

again, i dont think he deserves to be fired.  on the whole, i like his approach and agree with most of it.  we will have to see how the prospects progress.

That's fair. Just wanted to see whether you were siding with the pitchfork people, too. 😉 

I think Harris put together a team talented enough to get to win playoff series. We didn't know that for most of 2024, and we assumed that going into 2025, and both years, we did, because the players were talented enough, good enough, and won enough as a collective unit to do so. I think that's pretty good, and I'm eager to see how 2026 shapes up.

[Tenacious D]

42 minutes ago, chasfh said:

So, blame Harris 100% for the collapse and give zero credit for the comeback? Got it. Hey, people agree with you.

Not what I said.  I just don’t know how you can give Harris the credit for the Tigers hot streak, post ‘24 trade deadline.

That was literally the best piece of managing, along with a lot of luck, I think I’ve ever seen since Morris Buttermaker in ‘76.

[Shelton]

50 minutes ago, casimir said:

Why only August?  Why not September?

Seems like if his moves at a certain point in time caused the team to become worse, they would have become worse at that point in time. Maybe his moves kept them from being 12-16 in August instead.

Maybe not every high variance set of results needs to have a distinct cause assigned. 

[NorthWoods]

14 hours ago, tiger2022 said:

What exactly did Harris do for that to happen?  The Tigers just got really lucky with their wins and losses.  It was all Avila's guys that were already on the roster.  He didn't add anyone to help.

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

[gehringer_2]

35 minutes ago, Shelton said:

Seems like if his moves at a certain point in time caused the team to become worse, they would have become worse at that point in time. Maybe his moves kept them from being 12-16 in August instead.

Maybe not every high variance set of results needs to have a distinct cause assigned. 

Paddock had three starts they won in August, and got shelled twice but with a 6.4 ERA they moved him to the BP, where he raised his ERA to 8 in Sept. That meant they had to backfill starts with pitchers that were otherwise off the end of the rotation.  With Morton the swing was even worse. They won 2 of Charlie's August starts as he put up a 4.6 ERA (not too terrible), but then lost all 4 of his Sept starts as his ERA ballooned to over 12. Paddock did start game 162 and gave up 4 runs in 5 IP in a loss.

So part of your explanation is that two players arrived in August, but they both performed worse in Sept, with Morton becoming completely unplayable.

Logic dictates that the effect of a cause does have to come after it, but not necessarily *immediately* after it. 

Edited 1 hour ago by gehringer_2

[Tiger337]

 

22 minutes ago, NorthWoods said:

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

But the biggest deal he made was trading Flaherty and now he's brought him back two times

[Shelton]

15 minutes ago, NorthWoods said:

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

I think you are selling him a bit short here. He did that, sure. He also took over an organization full of “Avila guys” that was pretty terrible. Meadows and Dingler were close to non-prospects. But your point is very good. Taking Avila’s chicken **** and making chicken salad is not just something that happens. 
 

But, beyond that, he added Vierling and McKinstry and Holton, each of whom played a big role in the 2024 success. Trey Sweeney was very good over his six week stint in 2024 and was a big reason they made the comeback they did, and we don’t have him if Scotty hadn’t signed Jack and flipped him. 
 

 

[Tiger337]

1 hour ago, chasfh said:

Personally, I think the players should get more of the credit in 2024 and more of the blame in 2025 than anyone here has been giving them for either.

Giving players credit and blame is generally something I am on board with.  

[Tiger337]

2 hours ago, oblong said:

what's the ****ing difference between when a team wins or loses their games?  They went 3-13 down the stretch in 2025.   A baseball team going 3-13 is not unheard of.  They went 5-13 in May of 2024.  One season is great, the other is horrible?  That makes no logical sense and just speaks to the ignorant sports talk show mentality.  

If fans were told prior to each of the '24 and '25 seasosn they would win 86 and 87 game, the fans would have been ok with that.  

 

 

I agree with this.  Both seasons had he same result and it was a good one.  Sequencing of good and bad streaks doesn't matter much.  

[Shelton]

9 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

Paddock had three starts they won in August, and got shelled twice but with a 6.4 ERA they moved him to the BP, where he raised his ERA to 8 in Sept. That meant they had to backfill starts with pitchers that were otherwise off the end of the rotation.  With Morton the swing was even worse. They won 2 of Charlie's August starts as put up a 4.6 ERA, but then lost all 4 of his Sept starts as his ERA ballooned to over 12. Paddock did start game 162 and gave up 4 runs in 5 IP in a loss.

So part of your explanation is that two players arrived in August, but they both performed worse in Sept, with Morton becoming completely unplayable.

Logic dictates that the effect of a cause does have to come after it, but not necessarily *immediately* after it. 

What about Finnegan?
 

Logic also dictates that you have to consider who else would have had to have been in their position in those starts, and who would have had to backfill if they weren’t there. 
 

The point is that just because the team performed worse doesn’t mean he made the team worse, which is a point being made repeatedly in here. With the buffer they had, merely limiting the damage is still a positive relative to the baseline. 
 

Let’s not forget that they also struggled on each side of the all-star break, so it’s not like they had some well-oiled machine that he threw a wrench into by adding Charlie Morton.
 

[gehringer_2]

8 minutes ago, Shelton said:

What about Finnegan?

 

Finnegan was great. But what if he had brought in Finnegan but not Morton. There is your win/win! ⚾

I'll freely admit I'm biased here because I HATE seeing my team sign old over the hill pitchers. I hated when DD did it, I hate it when Harris does it. Just strikes me as letting your hope (that you get something when the odds are you won't) win out over keeping your head in the real world and making a better move.

Edited 1 hour ago by gehringer_2

[Sports_Freak]

2 hours ago, casimir said:

Why only August?  Why not September?

[Shelton]

11 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

Finnegan was great. But what if he had brought in Finnegan but not Morton. There is your win/win! ⚾

I'll freely admit I'm biased here because I HATE seeing my team sign old over the hill pitchers. I hated when DD did it, I hate it when Harris does it. Just strikes me as letting your hope (that you get something when the odds are you won't) win out over keeping your head in the real world and making a better move.

See, that’s the rub, and I don’t disagree. However, it’s easy to say he should have just “made a better move.” Could have acquired a better pitcher than Paddack or Morton? Surely. But at what cost? And even if we had (at some unknown cost), to what benefit? Would it have been enough to have clinched a bye? I’m not so sure. Would we have made it to the ALCS or WS? Also hard to say, but probably not. Maybe Skubal should have performed “better” in his game 2 and game 5 ALDS starts.

I think one problem we likely ran into is that to get a “better” pitcher in that trade market, Harris probably would have had to move Kevin, Max C, Bryce, Josue, or Melton. I know folks want to keep creating deals involving max anderson and hao-yu Lee, but you can’t make other teams like your mid-tier prospects more than another team’s mid-tier prospects. There is a long list of hypothetical moves ai think Harris should have made, but I’m not so sure that’s a list with any basis in reality.

I’m glad he didn’t trade any of the big 5 to add a 1-2% increase in reaching a particular round of the postseason. 

[Tiger337]

2 hours ago, oblong said:

he's just a college boy more concerned about his haircut and quarter zips than baseball.  

I don't understand the hair thing.  I don't notice anything about his hair.  

The quarter zips are a problem though.  He needs to get some striped polos.  

[Sports_Freak]

29 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

I agree with this.  Both seasons had he same result and it was a good one.  Sequencing of good and bad streaks doesn't matter much.  

The Tigers divisional collapse of 2025 will be discussed for generations. Any time a team loses a division lead, it will be compared to the 2025 Detroit Tigers.

 

[Shelton]

12 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

Good point, please go back and edit your posts to say that Harris made the team better in August and worse in September and did just enough to reach the playoffs for the second year running. We wouldn’t want to leave anything out. 

[Tiger337]

1 minute ago, Sports_Freak said:

The Tigers divisional collapse of 2025 will be discussed for generations. Any time a team loses a division lead, it will be compared to the 2025 Detroit Tigers.

 

I'll remember 2024 more than 2025.  2024 was the most unexpected and remarkable comeback I have ever seen and I hope it does not get forgotten.  The 2025 collapse was really bad, but it's not as memorable because they still made the playoffs at the end.  

[Tenacious D]

3 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

I don't understand the hair thing.  I don't notice anything about his hair.  

The quarter zips are a problem though.  He needs to get some striped polos.  

I’ve seen him around downtown Birmingham on occasion (usually the Sunday Farmer’s Market).  Dude has polos and T-shirts in his repertoire, too, but he’s no slave to fashion like DD was.

[Tiger337]

3 minutes ago, Shelton said:

Good point, please go back and edit your posts to say that Harris made the team better in August and worse in September and did just enough to reach the playoffs for the second year running. We wouldn’t want to leave anything out. 

He just wanted to make it interesting.  Great entertainment in both 2024 and 2025.