Tigers rumors: Detroit open to trading Prince Fielder

With MLB's General Manager meetings in progress, baseball's rumor silly season has arrived. Henry Schulman, Giants beat writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, reports the Detroit Tigers are open to trading first baseman Prince Fielder.

Interesting GM meetings nugget from an AL exec, who's heard Tigers would listen on Prince (who must have some no-trade rights).

— Henry Schulman (@hankschulman) November 13, 2013

Before everyone gets excited, this rumor is just so much off-season speculation, or more correctly, BS. Of course the Tigers are open to a trade, and not only of their highly-paid first baseman. Everyone is available for the right price. But it doesn't mean a trade is close to going down.

It's the longest of long of shots the Tigers could pull off such a monumental deal. Fielder's value is at an all-time low, coming off a down regular season and even worse post-season, which included a divorce which adversely affected his play. The 29-year-old slugger is owed far too much money ($168 Million) for far too long (seven years) to have anyone seriously believe a trade is on the horizon. To make a deal palatable for any team, the Tigers would need to eat of a significant portion of Fielder's contract. If there's even a hint of a payroll crunch, that's not happening.

Unless the Tigers get some sort of ridiculous offer (which isn't coming) and eat a metric ton of cash (which isn't likely) they are better off riding out the current wave of Fielder fan hate and hope for a bounce back season (which is a much better bet). Keep in mind Fielder is one year removed from an excellent .313/.412/.528 season where he hit 30 homers with 108 RBIs and finished ninth in the AL MVP vote.

This rumor is much in the same as vein as those which have the Tigers willing to listen to offers for Cy Young winner-to-be Max Scherzer. GM Dave Dombrowski is performing his due diligence, finding out what his players might get in return in trade. He wouldn't be doing his job otherwise.

Sure, the Tigers are open to trading Prince Fielder. In other news, I'm open to winning the lottery.

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