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Not to beat the dead horse, but the current iteration of the Detroit Tigers have not been fun to watch for most fans. Between the absolute absence of offense, the regular bullpen meltdowns, and the “Turnbull and Boyd, then get destroyed” starting rotation, those bright spots that keep the fanbase engaged are becoming harder and harder to find.
Today’s open thread began with an earlier tweet where I asked which team in the past four decades was the “most entertaining worst team”, with the choices being 2003, 2002, 1996 and 1989. However, I have decided to expand this query to include every team regardless of record, and have opened the timeline to as long as any of our readers can remember.
This years' Tigers squad is easily one of the worst in my lifetime. Going back to 1977, we've seen some bad teams, but not all of them have been as excruciatingly painful to watch as this seasons'. What year had the most entertaining worst team in past 4 decades?
— Adam Dubbin (@AdamDubbin) June 27, 2019
Just because a team made it to the playoffs or finished at the bottom of the standings does not necessarily dictate the general fan sentiment for that season. For example, despite making it all the way to the World Series, some may feel like 2012 was an underwhelming season; on the flip side if one followed the team during the early 90s they may have enjoyed watching Mickey Tettleton, Rob Deer and Cecil Fielder swinging for the fences every evening.
Which leads us to our Question of the Day:
Which Tigers team was the most entertaining to watch?
As mentioned in the introduction, the parameters for this question are completely open to time and interpretation. Personally, the 2013 season was the most entertaining year in my memory, until David Ortiz planted that Joaquín Benoit changeup into the bullpen. That season aside, however, if I strip away the team’s record and consider my raw enjoyment of the game, it would be 1990 when Cecil Fielder hit 51 home runs — two on the very last day! — that had me checking the Prodigy scoreboard regularly throughout the summer. And even the abysmal 1996 squad had peak Bobby Higginson with Travis Fryman and Tony Clark to provide some spark. There were also some entertaining lineups before my time, so please let me know what year was the most entertaining for you in the comments.