2022 DETROIT TIGERS REGULAR SEASON THREAD

[chasfh]

Even with the benefit of a mental health leave available, a lot of workers aren't comfortable yet asking for one. There's some work to do to get workers comfortable with the idea. This might be one benefit in which the employers are actually ahead of the employees when it comes to acceptance.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/paid-leave-covers-mental-health-days-but-stigma-still-clouds-use

 

[Motor City Sonics]

Just give Miggy his money for next year and have an appreciation day.   Hopefully they have a home game April 18th next year and they can have a 40th birthday party for him and new Tigers GM Atanas Illitch can bring some of the game's superstars in to celebrate it and then we can all move on.   This is such a long, sad slog to the end. 

[Motor City Sonics]

They have to go 12-16 the rest of the way to avoid 100 loss season.       I don't see that happening. 

[gehringer_2]

4 minutes ago, Motor City Sonics said:

They have to go 12-16 the rest of the way to avoid 100 loss season.       I don't see that happening. 

what a waste of a season. Lose 3 starting pitchers to surgery. No big breakthrough from Tork or Baddoo, Greene loses half a season, Barnhart a bust, Baez a not quite but close to a bust, ERod goes AWOL, and Austin Meadows self immolates. 

They should have just stayed in a cave somewhere in Florida and sent the Mudhens to play out their schedule.

[Motor City Sonics]

2 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

what a waste of a season. Lose 3 starting pitchers to surgery. No big breakthrough from Tork or Baddoo, Greene loses half a season, Barnhart a bust, Baez a not quite but close to a bust, ERod goes AWOL, and Austin Meadows self immolates. 

They should have just stayed in a cave somewhere in Florida and sent the Mudhens to play out their schedule.

I don't know, the foul ball off Greene's foot.................safe to call it an Omen now, ain't it?  

[RandyMarsh]

11 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

what a waste of a season. Lose 3 starting pitchers to surgery. No big breakthrough from Tork or Baddoo, Greene loses half a season, Barnhart a bust, Baez a not quite but close to a bust, ERod goes AWOL, and Austin Meadows self immolates. 

They should have just stayed in a cave somewhere in Florida and sent the Mudhens to play out their schedule.

Yep seriously never in my wildest dreams did I ever expect this season to end up being as bad as it has been. I'm not talking just record wise cause I thought they could be a 90 to 100 team if things didn't go right but I thought if they got to that it would be more from bullpen implosions, bad luck in 1 run games and maybe a couple guys having down years.

I thought though even if that were to happen we'd atleast get some bright spots that would give us hope for 2023 but that hasn't been the case at all. The rare bright spots have come from back end starters or some relievers who very likely aren't going to repeat themselves next year.  

Edited September 5, 2022 by RandyMarsh

[mtutiger]

45 minutes ago, RandyMarsh said:

Yep seriously never in my wildest dreams did I ever expect this season to end up being as bad as it has been. I'm not talking just record wise cause I thought they could be a 90 to 100 team if things didn't go right but I thought if they got to that it would be more from bullpen implosions, bad luck in 1 run games and maybe a couple guys having down years.

I thought though even if that were to happen we'd atleast get some bright spots that would give us hope for 2023 but that hasn't been the case at all. The rare bright spots have come from back end starters or some relievers who very likely aren't going to repeat themselves next year.  

All true.

But there is one bright spot that you don't have to squint too hard to see... Al Avila is gone. That wasn't treated as a given around here until it actually happened.

[SoCalTiger]

2 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

what a waste of a season. Lose 3 starting pitchers to surgery. No big breakthrough from Tork or Baddoo, Greene loses half a season, Barnhart a bust, Baez a not quite but close to a bust, ERod goes AWOL, and Austin Meadows self immolates. 

They should have just stayed in a cave somewhere in Florida and sent the Mudhens to play out their schedule.

“ You just can’t make this stuff up “- Jim Price 

[bobrob2004]

2 hours ago, RandyMarsh said:

Yep seriously never in my wildest dreams did I ever expect this season to end up being as bad as it has been. I'm not talking just record wise cause I thought they could be a 90 to 100 team if things didn't go right but I thought if they got to that it would be more from bullpen implosions, bad luck in 1 run games and maybe a couple guys having down years.

I thought though even if that were to happen we'd atleast get some bright spots that would give us hope for 2023 but that hasn't been the case at all. The rare bright spots have come from back end starters or some relievers who very likely aren't going to repeat themselves next year.  

.500 might have been a stretch, although that's what I was hoping for.  But the Tigers are the 4th worst team in baseball and are only 4 games better than the worst team in baseball.

Washington: 47-87 | .351

Pittsburgh: 49-84 | .368

Oakland: 50-85 | .370

Detroit: 51-83 | .381

.389 winning% is the magic number to avoid 100 losses.

 

Edited September 5, 2022 by bobrob2004

[RandyMarsh]

1 minute ago, bobrob2004 said:

.500 might have been a stretch, although that's what I was hoping for.  But the Tigers are the 4th worst team in baseball and are only 4 games better than the worst team in baseball.

Washington: 47-87 | .351

Pittsburg: 49-84 | .368

Oakland: 50-85 | .370

Detroit: 51-83 | .381

.389 winning% is the magic number to avoid 100 losses.

 

I admittedly was somewhat guilty of this but I think many fans got sucked into believing that the way we played for the last 4 1/2 months last year where we were close to .500 was our norm when in actually that wasn't. IIRC many projection systems had us at around 70 wins going into this year and again IIRC many people thought that was way low but it's looking like that was probably correct and 70ish wins was probably what we would've won under normal circumstances, maybe could've gotten to 80 if things went right or maybe only win 60 if things went wrong like what happened.

I guess the only thing that would've been worse is that if we finished with 100 losses despite all our players having good seasons, that would show you that we have very little room for improvement with the current roster but that of course wasn't the case.  

[HeyAbbott]

I'm back from an almost four weeks visiting family on the east coast. I thought that this team was going to be slightly better than an 80 win team, and I couldn't have been more wrong. What this season has revealed is this organization is a dumpster fire of biblical proportions. I think that the best that can be hoped for in 2023, is a sorting of the wheat from the chaff. We might have 4 position players on the active roster that might be MLB caliber players next year.

Get this GM hire right Chris I, or your MLB club will be nigh to worthless

[Motor City Sonics]

8 hours ago, HeyAbbott said:

I'm back from an almost four weeks visiting family on the east coast. I thought that this team was going to be slightly better than an 80 win team, and I couldn't have been more wrong. What this season has revealed is this organization is a dumpster fire of biblical proportions. I think that the best that can be hoped for in 2023, is a sorting of the wheat from the chaff. We might have 4 position players on the active roster that might be MLB caliber players next year.

Get this GM hire right Chris I, or your MLB club will be nigh to worthless

LOL.   He won't get it right.  He'll go cheap.   The only get it right scenario is firing absolutely everybody on the baseball operation side.  I mean everyone.    Why is A.J. in on hiring the next GM.  That's very Lionesque right there.  A.J. should be gone too.   How people aren't lumping him in with this disaster is shocking to me.    Several veteran players all having their worst year and a #1 draft pick that was mishandled from day one...........that's on him as much as anyone else.    I'll stick by my assessment that if they don't fire every single scout and every single coach/trainer/evaluator, then they aren't serious about making things better.   This has been going on for decades and the only time this team has been respectable since the late 80s was when they had an owner who was willing to spend stupid money to get guys here.   Well we don't have that anymore and unless they sell the team, we won't ever have that again.    They've hit on some pitchers in the draft, but not enough and well.........the last position player to make more than one All-Star team is Curtis Granderson (2009 & 2012).   Either they can't recognize talent or they can't develop it - or in the Tigers case - I think it's both.     I won't say Torkelson is a bust yet, but unless we get some different people working with him, he will be.   I had a soft spot for Chris Fetter and the job he's done with the pitching staff, but with the unfathomable amount of pitching injuries on this team, I think you have to wonder if he has played a part in that.

    They aren't just unlucky, they're pathetic and the owner couldn't give a fuck.      Well, I haven't watched a game since the day my dog died (July 6th) and I haven't missed it.    Look at the post count on Game Threads in this universe of ours.  Look at how low it is.  I know we don't mean much of anything in the grand scheme, but we're the fucking die-hards and if we've turned away, it's a worse-case scenario because the passive fans will follow.   No more cards left to play, the big prospects are here now, all they have left is Miguel Appreciation Day (which should be the last home game this season).   What are you gonna sell us next year?     Harold Castro is literally our best hitter.   

Edited September 5, 2022 by Motor City Sonics

[Motor City Sonics]

Seriously, who is going to be Tiger Of The Year? 

Tarik Skubal, I guess (missed 40% of the season).    Don't sell me Gregory Soto.   

Of the hitters the candidates would be  Harold Castro or............or........Riley Greene?  

Javier Baez, having the absolute worst year of his career, leads our team in WAR.  He has 21 errors with 3 weeks to go and it could be 25 if Torkelson hadn't bailed him out so many times. 

So infuriating. 

 

[romad1]

9 hours ago, HeyAbbott said:

I'm back from an almost four weeks visiting family on the east coast. I thought that this team was going to be slightly better than an 80 win team, and I couldn't have been more wrong. What this season has revealed is this organization is a dumpster fire of biblical proportions. I think that the best that can be hoped for in 2023, is a sorting of the wheat from the chaff. We might have 4 position players on the active roster that might be MLB caliber players next year.

Get this GM hire right Chris I, or your MLB club will be nigh to worthless

A Steve Yzerman clone exists and his name is Kirk Gibson but he's not a well man.   Perhaps we should start talking about Leyland vets who are moving into front offices or perhaps our fragile Michigan egos should accept that outsiders sometimes are the right answer so long as they aren't flaming asshats like Matt Patricia.

[mtutiger]

17 minutes ago, Motor City Sonics said:

Seriously, who is going to be Tiger Of The Year? 

Tarik Skubal, I guess (missed 40% of the season).    Don't sell me Gregory Soto.   

Of the hitters the candidates would be  Harold Castro or............or........Riley Greene?  

Javier Baez, having the absolute worst year of his career, leads our team in WAR.  He has 21 errors with 3 weeks to go and it could be 25 if Torkelson hadn't bailed him out so many times. 

So infuriating. 

 

My vote is for Drew Hutchison... DFA'd a bunch of times, yet one of their more effective pitchers and one who hasn't hit the injury list.

Infuriating.

[Jim Cowan]

25 minutes ago, Motor City Sonics said:

Why is A.J. in on hiring the next GM.  

That is not something that I am worried about yet.  It gets stated as fact here on MTS but I don't recall Ilitch saying it.  What he said was that AJ Hinch would assist with transactions in the absence of a GM.  That's a long long way from being involved in the search process.  So at the moment there is no cause for alarm unless I missed something.

[Motor City Sonics]

3 minutes ago, Jim Cowan said:

That is not something that I am worried about yet.  It gets stated as fact here on MTS but I don't recall Ilitch saying it.  What he said was that AJ Hinch would assist with transactions in the absence of a GM.  That's a long long way from being involved in the search process.  So at the moment there is no cause for alarm unless I missed something.

There IS cause for alarm, Chris Illitch still owns this team.  

[chasfh]

13 minutes ago, Jim Cowan said:

That is not something that I am worried about yet.  It gets stated as fact here on MTS but I don't recall Ilitch saying it.  What he said was that AJ Hinch would assist with transactions in the absence of a GM.  That's a long long way from being involved in the search process.  So at the moment there is no cause for alarm unless I missed something.

Stavenhagen confirmed on his podcast that both A.J. and Ryan Garko will be very involved in the GM search, and Petzold, Woodbery, and Beck have all confirmed that Ilitch said Hinch will be involved.

Given the unique state of this team, particularly the incompetence of the ownership and front office in terms of how baseball is run today, as well as these two guys being practically the only key people in the organization having any experience at winning organizations, I'd be alarmed if they weren't involved.

[gehringer_2]

1 hour ago, Motor City Sonics said:

 I won't say Torkelson is a bust yet, but unless we get some different people working with him, he will be. 

When Torkeson got back to Toledo, his OPS was 630 over his first 70 AB. In his last 50 there it was 916. Should this be telling us something about the effectiveness of the coaching he was getting in Detroit? It took basically one month with the Hens to turn him back around. Tigers had a charmed season last year and sure it's fair to say Hinch may have had something to do with that, but the evidence has built up that there something wrong with what they are doing with the hitters this season. I wouldn't say it's proof, but it's strong enough to make me question what Hinch is doing either in terms of his leadership, his approach to data/analytics information flow, or his coaching staff selections.

Edited September 5, 2022 by gehringer_2

[Jim Cowan]

Having the field coaches involved in front office personnel decisions is what really stupid NFL teams do.  Chris Ilitch needs help obviously but it has to be from outside the organization.

[romad1]

26 minutes ago, gehringer_2 said:

When Torkeson got back to Toledo, his OPS was 630 over his first 70 AB. In his last 50 there it was 916. Should this be telling us something about the effectiveness of the coaching he was getting in Detroit? It took basically one month with the Hens to turn him back around. Tigers had a charmed season last year and sure it's fair to say Hinch may have had something to do with that, but the evidence has built up that there something wrong with what they are doing with the hitters this season. I wouldn't say it's proof, but it's strong enough to make me question what Hinch is doing either in terms of his leadership, his approach to data/analytics information flow, or his coaching staff selections.

Legendary Lloyd for GM?

[sabretooth]

18 hours ago, chasfh said:

Even with the benefit of a mental health leave available, a lot of workers aren't comfortable yet asking for one. There's some work to do to get workers comfortable with the idea. This might be one benefit in which the employers are actually ahead of the employees when it comes to acceptance.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/daily-labor-report/paid-leave-covers-mental-health-days-but-stigma-still-clouds-use

My son was about to graduate from U/M with honors, and is a popular guy, and all of a sudden he was hit with a freight train of issues that have sidelined him from finishing college for two years. 

Fortunately we have identified physical ailments that were undetected that surgery has largely remedied, but he has two+ years of pain and emotional dislocation that he is working through with counseling and medication.  He may be one of the very fortunate ones to have the right team and diagnosis.

Mental health issues are no joke.  I have all the sympathy in the world for Austin and I hope that he comes out of this with his identity and life intact.

[sabretooth]

14 hours ago, gehringer_2 said:

what a waste of a season. Lose 3 starting pitchers to surgery. No big breakthrough from Tork or Baddoo, Greene loses half a season, Barnhart a bust, Baez a not quite but close to a bust, ERod goes AWOL, and Austin Meadows self immolates. 

They should have just stayed in a cave somewhere in Florida and sent the Mudhens to play out their schedule.

Barnhart has had a 109 OPS+ for the last 30 days, 12% K rate, .330 BABIP.  Too late for him here, I figure, but maybe hes finally remembered how to hit like a decent backup C.

[sabretooth]

Baddoo is another guy that is a head scratcher.  He clearly has the skill set to be a decent hitter but he has seemingly forgotten how to hit, like most of the guys on this team this year.

I understand having a tough year but OPSing sub 500 is just ridiculous.

Baffling.

[chasfh]

Hinch and Garko are both very recently from outside the organization, as opposed to practically everyone at the top of the front office who has been ossifying there for a decade or two. I don't know what getting a third-party consultant to lead the search, and who does not have the intrinsic understanding of the Tigers' system that certainly Hinch and perhaps Garko do by now, would add to the process.