Maybe Wolf will be a conversion to bullpen guy?
I still think Ryan may be, but totally speculative. I think they want to see him as a starter first and how he holds up, workload-wise.
Kash and Brady Smith help the next wave of pitchers coming through as Olson will work through his team control (3 more years)and Framber drops off (2 more years assuming the 4th season mutual option at $40m isn’t picked up).
Whole lotta swing and miss with Kash. Likey.
The tiger’s biggest weakness in the current minor league system was pitching. They strongly overhauled that weakness this weekend. Some encouraging position players still left in the system, now the same can be said for pitchers
Good question. It seems like they would have been added once they signed with the team.
I will be interested to see where Flukey falls compared to the guy we just got from San Diego.
We got some top pitching prospects now for the first time in a while.
Baseball needs a salary cap.
Yeah they do. But whats the cap? Do lad have a few years to clear it or other teams as well who spend like crazy
Not sure, but man teams in baseball more than any other sport invest an extraordinary amount of effort into developing their players. Years. Multiple layers of development. Now some of that does get protected by how long big leaguers take to be free agents, but our situation is outrageous. We have to get rid of two top end starters when were competing and in a playoff race? The same thing happened last year. Its not like were a small market. There needs to be a better way to pay the players but also protect against teams losing all the effort to develop a player just to see him go to another team in his prime.
That’s an interesting reversal.
For years, I and others complained about the Dombrowski-Avila theory of picking as many pitchers as you can and leaving the minor systems bereft of position players. It showed up in the BA and OBP of many Tigers starters who weren’t FA acquisitions.
With Harris, the pendulum swung in the other direction and that’s one positive thing he’s accomplished, i.e. better hitters/better OBP focus.
as much as I criticize DD have to realize it was a different era in MLB in his tenure with the Tigers. Avila paid the price as prospect value changed in the transition from DD to Avila and today’s roster in Detroit has a significant Avila influence.
Under DD he would draft flame throwers with Mike Ilitch paying over slot or taking prospects that other teams didn’t draft as they knew they couldn’t sign. He would then treat those flame throwers as money to be traded for high profile FA’s and it worked. Well, worked with the exception of a WS title. But DD killed this team with his view of analytics and shit development staff, set them back years.
That is the area that Harris appears to excel, drafting, prospect identification and development; hitting, pitching and fielding plus analytics etc etc. DD didn’t put the money or time into it. The stories from friends inside the Tigers organization on how far behind they were compared to the rest of MLB was startling. Chris I has spent a small fortune changing all that, over 100m so far.
Agree, it was far worse during the Avila era because Dombrowski had mostly teams loaded with veteran players (who were actually good).
Well, Dombrowski did Avila no favors with how he left Tigers from a minor league system, development system and aging veterans.
My emotions are with you on this one man. I know all of the logical reasons why we SHOULD have traded Skubal and Mize.
But we traded the best pitcher in baseball and another starter for a handful of prospects who might be available next year. Or maybe the year after. And that’s when they MIGHT be good. Or you know, maybe not.
It’s super frustrating, and makes me not want to watch the Tigers. At this rate, we could be competitive again (as in, a playoff team who wins a playoff series or two) in what, three years? Four? Hopefully? Ugh.
Maybe it’s that Illitch won’t sign them with big money. Maybe those guys would not have signed either way. Maybe it’s the overall structure of the league, or the absolutely ridiculous disparity between team payrolls. But it all washes out to the same end.
Wait several years to get good players. Once they become good, have a little pitter of success, maybe even an almost run (The Pudge/Verlander years, for example, or last year’s exciting finish). But no, then the good players are too expensive. Better trade them away for new prospects, and hope we are good in five years!
I appreciate how others can ride that ride. I’m just not super interested, and pretty mad at baseball/the MLB/the tigers/the system right now.
Tigers should be competitive this season, optimistic view grant you, and also the next season there is baseball. It remains a talented team in spite of losing Skubal and Mize.
I hope you are right! I’ll try to look at it with brighter eyes…
There is a lot of talent on the current roster,
Dingler 27
Tork 26, being kind
Greene 25
McGonigle 22
Clark, 21 optimistic
Keith 24 even if utility going forward
Melton
Jobe
Montero
Carp
Lee, hopefully
Anderson in the wings, possibly.
Valdez, has been better than his record indicates while underperfoming the contract at same time.
Then add in Ryan as SP or BP guy in September
Hope in 2028
There’s a lot to like.
How in the hell do the Mets sell like 6 pitchers and a couple hitters and still not have a top 100 prospect?
They’re the Mets?
High enough for the Dodgers to not sign Skubal. That’s my only criteria.
What LAD pay roll? I would imagine thats where it will be
The frustrating part is that here I am waiting for these two hot shots to finally break into the big leagues to go with our dominant starters and as soon as they get up here were forced to trade the starters away. Its like they are cat chasing its tail. I do understand some of the logic, but the NYY or Dodgers don’t do this…