Are the Tigers Complacent, or Just Confident?

AJax needs to go to the bottom of the order. Can’t we find a serviceable leadoff hitter?

I’d just like to note that before BYB, I was perfectly content with not thinking about baseball for a couple months.

Can’t un-bite that apple.

/sigh

this was a very good article by tigerdog,it echoes a lot of my and most other tiger fans concerns..but,in my post the other day i agreed and still do with mr.allen and others,while a platoon at 2nd and 3rd isnt what WE want to see im inclined to let it play out and see where we stand at the 1/4 and 1/2 way points and let DD make adjustments.however,theres always a however! tigerdog is right about the obp out of the top 1/3,that does give me pause.i guess that whay mr.cespedes is supposed to fix,that is a signing id like to see,we need speed,thats a painful fact to see,do i think we need to spend “stupidly” to upgrade 1 position with speed ,no,we need a couple.i know people are going to ask well then who do you want the tigers to get? and i say,let dd do his job its a long season,its not how you start,but how you finish.

…but my reluctance is not because I’m some sort of Brandon Inge fanboy or anything. Honestly, we’re nicely set in a lot of places — moreso than the average franchise, I’d wager to say — and we should be so lucky as to have to talk about these little patch-up jobs.

I’d be good if the roster stayed as it was. Invariably, something weird and/or unexpected will happen between mid-February and the start of April, and we’ll have some pretty big fish to fry around here.

I don’t think anything will actually be done until July, when some of the pretenders decide to start selling. Right now, there aren’t many teams willing to let go of players at prices the Tigers like. Somebody like your boy Chase Headley might be a lot cheaper in July than he would be right now.

I think that the top of the lineup needs to be addressed, but I believe that we have decent enough guys on the roster and our manager doesn’t value OBP like you or I do. Jackson, Boesch, Avila, Cabrera would be an “adequate” 1-2-3-4 punch. Here are 2011 OBP’s of that lineup: .317, .341, .389, .448. Jackson’s .317 is far below what we would like from a leadoff hitter, but I bet that he bounces back a bit and approximates what he did his rookie season (.345). I think we’ll see Boesch increase to above .350, but Avila will probably regress a bit. Jackson and Boesch have speed at the top of the lineup as well. It’s not ideal, but it’s very passable. I don’t think for a minute that Leyland will do it, but if he’s not willing to move Young out of the 3 spot when he already has viable internal options, it shows me that he doesn’t see it as a priority. If we really valued OBP from the top of the lineup, we’d just sign Fukudome instead of Young, save ourselves some cash, and have a LF that gets on base an extra 6% of the time over Young.

I’m fine with the 2B platoon for now. If we grant your wish and send Raburn to the OF, it makes Santiago our regular at 2B. He’s not a starter on a loaded big league team, but I also think the margin for improvement is low. When you look at somebody like Orlando Hudson, how much does it actually improve the team to have Hudson in there instead of Santiago? The marginal difference, based on expectations, is actually pretty low – maybe .015 in average, .030 in OBP, and .040 in SLG. I don’t think it would be worth the compensation or prospects it would take to get somebody that’s “a little better” and there’s nothing “a lot better” out there.

however I don’t feel much pressure to do it before Opening Day.
The Tigers need 2nd and 3rd basemen and a deeper Bullpen. I would focus on the BP (but I’m not a GM so what do I know?).
Overall, I like this team as it stands. I also have confidence that Dombrowski knows what he can and cannot do to improve it. If he can then he will. I hope he doesn’t sell the Farm just to get a big name player to start the season with. Injuries happen. Trades happen. Baseball happens. Right now Detroit looks capable of winning the AL Central. That has to be the first goal. As the season goes on (and those injuries and trades are taken into account) DD can make adjustments to improve the situation. (Think Fister). That’s his MO and I don’t see it changing. I trust him.

BTW: I am surprised at the % of poll takers who picked 3rd base. The pendulum has really swung away from Inge! Raburn at 2nd scares me more than Inge though.

Excellent writing, as usual T-Dog. As you know, I am a little higher on Ramon than you are. Ramon has never been given a chance by the Tigers to be the everyday pivot man, at least since his rookie year. They have given that chance to guys like Scott Sizemore and Will Rhymes. Why not give a good soldier like Ramon at least a chance to be the regular second baseman? I agree with you about Raburn: they should take his infielders glove away from him.

I was tempted to go with top of the order, but I think the “top of the order” problem is being overstated. Improvement is always a good idea, but we didn’t exactly have a bad lineup, Our top of the order problem is more a result of odd lineup construction than a poor collection of offensive players. The Top of the order may have not done a good job getting on-base, but the middle and bottom did a really good job of it. The Tigers 2011 lineup is case in point that lineup construction makes very little difference in the number of runs scored. Overall the tigers ranked #4 in baseball in OBP, Slugging, and Runs scored. The lineup did about what you would expect it to do, the odd construction doesn’t seem to have had much effect.

In describing the front office I don’t know if I would call them complacent, or confident. I would add another C and refer to DD and co. as “Calculated.” As described above, the Tigers have been linked to several players who would also provide a significant boost to the top of the lineup, but we really have no idea about how serious discussions ever got, or what kind of offer the Tigers made. I think it is instructive that players that are “available” and fans have lusted after, like Chase Headly , Matt Garza, and Nick Punto, haven’t just been missed by the Tigers, they haven’t moved at all. The front office knows what they have, a decent, if unspectacular product, they know they can improve, but aren’t winning to do so at any cost. The Tiger’s window doesn’t close after 2012, or 13 and I am whole heatedly in-favor of calculated decisions that improve our ability to compete in the long term, even if they don’t maximize our world series potential on a yearly basis.

Yes, the tigers are a good team. But, with the way things stand right now, they are going to the playoffs to be one and done. We’re lucky that Boston, NY, Tampa, Texas, AA get to fight it out for two playoff spots or do we expand this year? I cant remember. And look at AA’s pitching staff by adding Wilson. We cant just build for the division, we have to build for the whole thing. If we could get at least one solid mediocre infielder at 2nd or 3rd that would be a plus. The lineup we May be able to patch. Whats wrong with BB hitting 2nd, Young hitting 3rd, and I’d keep Cabby and vMART 4 and 5. If it isn’t broke don’t fix it. AJ strikes out way too much and is not good at the little things that make a lead off man. Bunt, put the ball in play, walks. Maybe Danny Worth can rescue us in one of the infield spots but he’s still pretty young and his bat is suspect. Although I’d take him over Inge.
But, still, the bottom line for most of it is, pitching, pitching, pitching. We are good there, I just dont know if were good enough.

Yes. Of course. But they have to be the right moves, and they don’t have a need to be in a hurry.

As you said, they ran away with the Central last year. Cleveland hasn’t improved. Chicago and Minnesota have gotten even worse. KC is still a year or two away from contending. And the Tigers have basically the same team as 2011, except they’ve added bullpen depth and finally have a backup catcher to spell Avila. Plus they have a full year of Doug Fister this time.

So, I feel there’s no rush to fill 2B and 3B with a guy they really don’t want. They’re fine as they are until they begin approaching the July 31st trade deadline. At that point, if they still aren’t adding players, I’ll join everyone in rosterbation panic mode. Until then, I feel confident that Dave Dombrowski is being patient and knows what he’s doing.

Which by all means is fine with that lineup, but the Rangers went out and signed Adrian Beltre and traded for Mike Napoli just to lose in the World Series again. You can as confident as you want — you should never be complacent in sports.

With that said, I think the Tigers are putting all their eggs in the Yoenis Cespedes basket. That’s fine but you better make sure you give him an offer he simply can’t refuse or else you’re in big trouble.

I also have no idea what their thinking (as well as everyone else) when it comes to second base and a lead off hitter. Prado, Izturis, we’ve heard the names and just had them all become nothing. We HAVE to make a move. The Twins are still a threat. We can’t expect Dunn to post another horrendous year. We can’t expect the Indians to just roll over in the second half again. The Royals are going to be a surprising threat. We need to make a move before it’s too late.

In 2009 and updated in 2010 I wrote a story highlighting all of Dombrowski’s screwups and how they put the Tigers in a bad position without a lot of flexibility. Now, Detroit is atop the division, has a clear path to the playoffs, and is looking at a market that doesn’t have a lot of realistic, affordable answers to their problems.

I’m glad they’re not freaking out. I think it shows they’ve learned from past mistakes and want to compete in the long haul and take what comes to them.

I mean just look at last year. No one would have been excited about the prospect of trading for Doug Fister. Yet he turned out to be an affordable acquisition midseason and fans can’t stop singing his praises now.

The Tigers need to keep their eyes open and grab the lower-profile players who really fit their needs when those opportunities arise.

I think it’s definitely top of the order which probably, as previously said means an upgrade at an upgradable position like 2b or 3b as well. What this teams lack is contact and baserunners for Miggy and Victor. There is really no answer on this roster to put a formidable 1-2-3 in front of the those guys. Ajax, Boesch, Young doesn’t get me excited. There is defintley potential there but I’d prefer a .300 guy with speed. I think if things stay this way you have to move Miggy up to the three hole.

At this point I’d really like to see 1 of 3 moves happen: sign Cespedes, sign Oswalt, or find a way to upgrade 3B.

I know sitting back and becoming complacent can get you in trouble, but I don’t think that’s what is happening here. Going into this season, I think it really is the Tigers as the clear cut favorite in the division and then everyone else. Not to say we can just assume we’ll win the Central again.. but with our current pieces, we should be able to compete until the deadline and then acquire a piece or two.