Gardy in Detroit

The word Thursday evening was that the Detroit Tigers had settled on Ron Gardenhire as their next manager, and the Boston Red Sox had settled on Alex Cora.

Neither deal was completely done, but assuming that nothing goes wrong in wrangling the contract details, Gardy will be back in the AL Central.

And good for him. I don't think Detroit is a particularly good fit for him, not that anybody is likely to win with the Tigers for a few years. It's an organization with an over-the-hill core and a weak farm system.

The good news is that ownership --with the passing of patriarch Mike Ilitch -- recognizes the necessity of rebuilding. The bad news is, they haven't much to rebuild with.

I don't view Gardenhire's strengths and weaknesses as a good fit for a rebuilding team. He was, throughout his tenure with the Twins, inclined to prefer proven players and impatient with youngsters. That was understandable when the Twins were contending, but during the last few seasons it was counterproductive. I don't know for sure that Oswaldo Arcia or Liam Hendricks would have turned into viable major league regulars with steadier opportunities; what I do know is that neither developed as hoped.

A team in the Tigers position, I think, would do better to go with a younger, even inexperienced, manager, one less beholden to his past.

I thought, and wrote, that Gardenhire's strengths fit well with the Red Sox. What he doesn't have, and the Sox may well have required, is a history of working with the advanced metrics in vogue today.

It's possible that the past season, spent working with Red Sox alum Torey Lovello with the Arizona Diamondbacks, taught Gardenhire what he was missing with his previous resistance to the new stats. Gardy's about the same age I am; I'd like to think that I'm capable still of growing. But I also know that it's harder for me to accept change.

Anyway, I don't jeer at this:

Source: In interview, #Tigers were impressed by Gardenhire’s openness to sabermetrics, which evolved during his tenure with #DBacks. @MLB

— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) October 20, 2017

I also won't jeer at those who want to see the evidence.

The Tigers after Mike Ilitch

Mike Ilitch in 2014.

Mike Ilitch, the beloved and big-spending owner of the Detroit Tigers (and the Detroit Red Wings in the NHL, and the founder of Little Ceasar's pizza), died Friday. He was 87.

Ilitch's death raises the genuine possibility that the Tigers will pull back from the win-now philosophy that has reigned there the past decade or so. Ilitch, who played minor league ball in the Tigers chain before knee injury forced him to find a different (and ultimately more lucrative) occupation, wanted a World Series title before he died. He didn't get it.
The word out of Detroit in the wake of Ilitch's death was that

• the Ilitch family will retain the teams; the Tigers and Red Wings will not be put up for sale;
• an Ilitch son has been the effective owner of the Tigers the past year or so and was the one who made the decision at the start of this offseason to stay the course with lots of veterans and a large, luxury-tax inducing payroll.

It seems possible to be that a different decision may have been made had the elder Ilitch died in, say, August. Mike Ilitch may not have been as active an owner as he once was, but I doubt there was any appetite for telling him to abandon those championship dreams.

Yet the odds were getting worse for the Tigers every year. The Tigers' arrow is pointed down. Miguel Cabrera and Jason Verlander are still outstanding players, but they are a bit less than they were five or six years ago, and they aren't getting younger.

Mike Ilitch fired Dave Dombrowski two summers ago when Dombrowski concluded that it was time to jettison some veterans and get younger. Ilitch didn't have time for a retrench and rebuild approach. Christopher Ilitch may conclude otherwise in the next year -- only he won't have Dombrowski, one of the most adept team builders in the game, making the moves.

Notes, quotes and comment

The word out of Chicago (where the Twins spent Thursday's off day) was that Kurt Suzuki's knee felt good enough that it was deemed unnecessary to see another doctor.

If that assessment is accurate, that's good. I certainly expected at the time of Wednesday's collision that Suzuki's season was over. We'll see, obviously, how all this plays out.

---

Plenty of Ron Gardenhire talk the past few days out of Detroit, where the chatter is that owner Mike Ilitch has decided that Brad Ausmus won't return as manager and that the 86-year-old owner wants Gardy as the dugout boss.

I can't help but notice that Al Avila, the new general manager in Motown, is barely mentioned in these reports. It's all being driven, apparently, by Ilitch. As a general rule, when owners start making basic baseball decisions, it turns out poorly.

One aspect in which Gardenhire is an obvious good fit for Detroit: His bullpens in Minnesota were generally quite good, and the relief corps in Detroit were, for both Ausmus and Jim Leyland, frequently the weakest point of the roster. And Gardy's preference for veterans fits well with an organization with one of the game's weakest farm systems.

The arrow is pointing down for Detroit right now. It's not a job positioned for immediate success, even with Miguel Cabrera and Justin Verlander on the roster. But Gardenhire wants to manage again, and there are only 30 such jobs.

Pic of the Week

Me and my shadow: Rajai Davis
of the Detroit Tigers reaches in
vain for Mike Zunino's RBI double
on Monday,

It's a good enough photo by itself with the shadow play behind Rajai Davis, but I picked this one in part to serve as a platform to comment on the Detroit Tigers.

With the nonwaiver trade deadline fast approaching, it's possible that we're seeing the end of an era in Detroit. The minuses are piling up for the Tigers: They're basically playing .500 ball or a bit less than that. Miguel Cabrera is injured. Justin Verlander has made just seven starts, and the Tigers haven't won any of them. The bullpen is (again) a problem. The rotation other than free-agent-to-be David Price is a mess.The farm system is widely considered to be barren. And, looking to the future, the day of reckoning for some long and sizable contracts is coming.

All that has created a sense that the Tigers will be peddling Price and Yoenis Cepedes, also due for free agency this month.

I'll believe it when I see it.

Remember: Mike Ilitch is 86 and wants a World Series title before he dies. This is not an owner with a timeline for rebuilding. The Tigers aren't THAT far out of a playoff spot, and I rather suspect that the fact that one of the teams they need to catch to get into the October tournament is the Twins is something of an encouragement for them.

They are, I think, more likely to keep Price and Cepedes, hope they can snag one of the wildcard berths and strive to do with that opening what the Kansas City Royals did last season. Then they'll make qualifying offers to Price and Cepedes and at least collect the draft picks should they sign elsewhere. The future is now for the Tigers, even if now isn't as promising as they expected coming into the season.

A catcher and his concussions

A dazed Alex Avila was pulled from Sunday's game
after taking a foul ball in the face mask.

Catchers, it has been noted over the years, generally age quickly. As we learn more about concussions, it seems reasonable to theorize that foul tips off the mask are no small part of that.

Alex Avila, the Detroit catcher, left Sunday's division series game after yet another foul ball off his mask. This is at least the third concussion he has suffered this season alone, and his second in less than two months. He went on the concussion disabled list last season. He has probably had other concussions that he never admitted.

The Tigers season is over with their loss Sunday, so Avila has the rest of the winter to recover. It may -- or may not -- be enough time.

Avila was a good hitting catcher a few years ago -- .295/.389/.506 with 19 homers in 2011 -- but he hasn't approached that level since.

Which is to say, he isn't Joe Mauer -- a catcher whose bat is good enough to play at another position. If Avila can't catch, he can't play in the majors. And the way his concussions are adding up, one has to wonder if he should catch.

It's his life, and his livelihood, and it's not my place to say aye or nay to him. But I expect the Detroit front office will this winter, at the least, line up some alternatives to Avila as the regular backstop.

Avila's only 27. But it looks like a very old 27.

Tigers and Royals

Eric Hosmer and Salvador Perez
celebrate as the Kansas City Royals
secured their first postseason berth
since winning the World Series in 1985.

They are, going into the final two days of the schedule, separated by just one game. But as close as they are in the standings, the Detroit Tigers and Kansas City Royals are very different teams, with almost mirror image strengths and weaknesses.

The Tigers have a brawny lineup. They stand second in the American League in runs scored and are closer to first than to third in that important stat. They're first in doubles (you'll never guess which team is second*), first in batting average, first in slugging percentage, first in on-base percentage,

Their starting rotation boasts the last three American League Cy Young Award winners, and they also have last year's ERA champ, who isn't one of the Cys.

But their bullpen -- despite the addition of numerous "proven closers" -- remains a minefield, and they are -- despite their drastic offseason infield makeover -- a dismal defensive team. The Tigers shed Prince Fielder so they could move Miguel Cabrera to first base and insert Nick Castellanos at third, and this was expected to improve the defense. Um ... not so much:

Stat of the Day: Nick Castellanos (-30 Runs Saved) is approaching Ryan Braun's record (-32, 2007) for the worst 3B season of the DRS era.
— John Dewan (@FieldingBible) September 23, 2014

(Last night Castellanos committed a throwing error that allowed the Twins two runs.)

The Royals, on the other hand, are ninth in the AL in runs scored, more than 100 fewer than the Tigers. They are the one AL team with fewer than 100 homers. They are dead last in walks drawn.

Their starting pitching is competent, but certainly James Shields, Danny Duffy, Yolando Ventura and Jason Vargas don't have the cachet of Max Scherzer, David Price and Justin Verlander.

What makes the Royals -- at least in the standings -- the virtual equivalent of the Tigers is their prowess afield and the smothering capacity of their bullpen. Kansas City has a collection of fleet outfielders and skilled infielders, with legit Gold Glove candidates at four or five positions. (Torii Hunter owns more Gold Gloves than the entire Royals roster put together, but he now covers about as much ground as those ugly trophies.)

To be sure, the Pythagorean Theorem doesn't see the two teams as near equals. By the simple formula of runs scored vs. runs allowed, Detroit "should" be four games better than Kansas City. By wins and losses, they're only one game better after 160 contests.

I've been neutral between the two teams. But the novelty of Kansas City in the playoffs is intriguing, and -- well, the Royals aren't winning the division title without help from the Twins this weekend. So let's go Royals.

*OK, I was wrong, and you did guess that the Twins are second.

The Tigers veteran arson squad

Joe Nathan has 27 saves for the Tigers -- and six blown
saves, with an ERA of 5.36. He has one more year
at $10 million left on his contract.

One of my many pet theories is that the bullpen is a measuring stick for an organization's competency. Relief pitching is both fragile and available. Good organizations, my theory holds, are aware of this and constantly re-evaluate their bullpens and seek to rebuild them on the fly. Top-notch managers are usually adept at identifying the failed starters whose strengths lend themselves to relief work and find the proper matchups.

That's the theory, and then there's the Detroit Tigers. The Tigers have dominated the AL Central the past three seasons and remain in the hunt this year, but their bullpens have been more hindrance than help. Given how well general manager Dave Dombrowski has done over the years in other aspects of the roster, that's surprising.

This year's Tigers bullpen is an assemblage of "proven closers" unlike almost any I can remember. Between the 40-man roster and the 60-day disabled list, they have

• Joe Nathan, 368 lifetime saves, six All-Star teams
• Joakim Soria, 177saves, two All-Star teams
• Jim Johnson, 124 saves, one All-Star team
• Joel Hanrahan, 100 saves, two All-Star teams

That's 769 saves and 11 All-Star rosters among the four of them. And we haven't even gotten to Detroit's passel of veteran setup men: Joba Chamberlain (seven saves), Phil Coke (eight saves), Al Alburquerque (one) ...

Nathan's addition (to a two-year, $20 million deal as a free agent) was supposed to put an end to the late-inning collapses, but the former Twins stopper has had a miserable season. Johnson led the majors in saves in 2012 and 2013 with Baltimore; this year he's been released by Oakland and has an ERA of 7.31. He and the currently DL'd Soira, briefly dubbed the "Mexicutioner" in his glory days with the Royals, were midseason additions. Hanrahan hasn't actually thrown a pitch for the Tigers this year and isn't likely to.

All these guys (except Chamberlain and Alburquerque, each 28) are at least 30 years old, and the resulting cluster of aged firemen-turned-arsonists suggests that somebody in the Detroit organization -- perhaps first-year manager Brad Ausmus. perhaps somebody higher in the organization -- is uncomfortable with the idea of identifying the suitable skill set in somebody unproven in the job.

Given the World Series-or-bust mindset in Detroit, that's understandable. It's also an expensive mistake.

Around the Division: Detroit Tigers

Julio Iglesias was supposed to be the Detroit shortstop
this season. If it happens, it will happen late in the season.

The Detroit Tigers started their offseason infield makeover in the middle of last season. With shortstop Jhonny Peralta facing a 50-game suspension, Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski engineered a three-team swap that brought sweet-fielding Jose Iglesias to the Motor City.

I don't know that Iglesias is as good as Peralta overall. Peralta is a much better hitter; Iglesias has superior range afield (and is probably more erratic). Iglesias is considerably younger and definitely cheaper.

Peralta is gone now, having signed with St. Louis as a free agent (a signing that I find curious, as the Cardinals front office is as savvy as any; they paid up for a small-range offensive shortstop with one PED strike against him). And now Iglesias is gone, destined for the disabled list with shin fractures in both legs.

Rumors upon rumors have resulted from that fact, starting with the notion, accuracy unknown, that Iglesias will miss the entire season (or most of it). The Tigers aren't saying much for the record beyond that the player is to see a specialist today, and Iglesias said this week he expects to play at some point. But since an offseason of rest didn't heal the fractures, out for the year seems plausible.

The prospect of this potential powerhouse entering the season patching the position with a plethora of utility men is unlikely. Mike Illich has spent a fortune chasing his World Series dreams, and something will happen soon.

The widespread expectation is that Stephen Drew will land in Detroit. The free agent shortstop is a Scott Boras client, and Illich-Dombrowski have done considerable business with Boras.

But Dombrowski, aware of the deteriorating status of his farm system, is probably reluctant to part with a first-round pick for a one-season rental, and Drew and Boras have indicated a reluctance to do a one-year deal anyway. And Iglesias remains prominent in the Tigers' longer-range plans.

Presumably Dombrowski could sign Drew to a multi-year deal and then trade him when Iglesias is healthy, much as he flipped Prince Fielder after two years. But that plan assumes there's a market for Drew down the road, and there hasn't been one so far this winter.

If not Drew, then what? A trade? The Seattle Mariners, having signed Robinson Cano, are believed to be shopping infielder Nick Franklin. But there's doubts that Franklin can handle shortstop. Jimmy Rollins, the Phillies veteran, has rather emphatically said he would reject a trade (he has that right as a 10-and-5 player), at least until he's passed Mick Schmidt as the franchise's all-time hits leader (he's 60 behind the Hall of Famer).

Another, more realistic possibility, has the Tigers trading for one of the two non-established shortstops now competing for the job with the Arizona Diamondbacks, Chris Owings and Didi Gregorius.

An Arizona deal is my guess. But I never figured the Tigers would react to the 2012 injury to Victor Martinez by signing Fielder either.

Around the division: Detroit Tigers

Doug Fister was 32-20, 3.29 in two-and-a-half seasons
in the Tigers rotation.

We Twins fans think Terry Ryan's been busy this offseason, signing two new starting pitchers. Ryan's got nothing on his Detroit counterpart, Dave Dombrowski.

As the Winter Meetings — usually the busiest period of the Hot Stove league — gets started, Dombrowski has already:

• Hired a manager to follow the retired Jim Leyland;
• Remade his infield, replacing three of 2013 regulars completely and moving the fourth to a different position;
• Signed a new closer and moved his best setup man to the starting rotation;
• Created a spot in the rotation by trading a very good starter.

It's a rather stunning makeover for a three-time division champ, albeit one that hasn't really met its expectations during the regular seasons.

I wrote at some length last month about the infield revamp; the only new development there is that Dombrowski has now explicitly said that Miguel Cabrera is moving to first base, with Nick Castellanos at third base.

Joe Nathan is chasing
a ring.

The new stuff revolves around the mound.

Begin at the end. Erstwhile Twin Joe Nathan, now 39, got a two-year deal (option for a third year) to close. The Tigers had issues in the back end of the bullpen the past two seasons, and rookie manager Brad Ausmus (assuming Nathan doesn't decline) won't have to do the juggling act Leyland did.

Joaquin Benoit, who finished 2013 as the Tigers closer, is a free agent, and Dombrowski has said he expects Benoit to sign elsewhere as a closer.

Drew Smyly, who went 6-0, 2.37 with two saves and 22 holds in relief last season, will move to the rotation. I had expected the lefty to take a starting job last spring; it will happen in 2014 instead.

And he won't be dislodging Rick Porcello, but Doug Fister.

Fister was traded to Washington for a package of utility man Steve Lombardozzi (son of the same-named second baseman of the 1987 Twins) and left-handed pitching prospects Robbie Ray and Ian Krol. It's an underwhelming return for Fister, who had quietly become one of the top 20 or so starters in baseball.

Dombrowski probably didn't get maximum value for Fister. I doubt that was his goal. His priorities in this trade were almost certainly

• Opening payroll space for Nathan;
• Trading Fister out of the American League;
• Adding left-handed pitching to a thinning farm system.

Dombrowski achieved those things. That the general consensus around the game is that he could have made a better deal probably doesn't cost him any sleep. The "better deals" presumably didn't meet his targeted desires.

The Tigers aren't in a talent-accumulating position. They're in a talent-arranging position. They're out to win now, not to build a base to win from.

The Tigers revamp their infield

Ian Kinsler has made three All-Star teams in his
eight major league seasons, all with the Texas Rangers.

The Prince Fielder-Ian Kinsler deal, once it becomes official, essentially means a complete revamp of the Detroit Tigers infield.

Presumably the Tigers will return Miguel Cabrera to first base and install prospect Nick Castellanos at third base. Castellanos is just 21 (turns 22 during spring training) and spent 2013 playing left field in Triple A, but third is reckoned his best position.

It's possible, of course, that the Tigers will add a veteran corner infielder -- ESPN's Tim Kurkjian on Wednesday night specifically named former Twins first baseman Justin Morneau as a possibility -- but if they really regard Castellanos as a major piece of their future, I think they'll avoid blocking him.

And that would represent quite the transition for a team that has prioritized offense over defense.

2013 infield: Fielder at first, Omar Infante at second, Cabrera at third, Jhonny Peralta at shortstop

2014 infield: Cabrera at first, Kinsler at second, Castellanos at third, Jose Iglesias at short.

That's three new faces, with the one holdover shifting position.

Peralta and Infante are free agents. Detroit general manager Dave Dombrowski had said early in the offseason that Peralta was unlikely to be re-signed; presumably the same is now true of Infante.

The Tigers traded for Iglesias in midseason just before Peralta was suspended 50 games for his involvement with Biogenesis. They are very different shortstops; Peralta has limited range but makes few mistakes and is a productive hitter. Iglesias is very rangy in the field but, despite a good set of rookie stats, is not expected to help at the plate.

Kinsler is Infante's superior in the field. Infante had the better 2013 at the plate, however, and Kinsler's numbers the past couple of years have not lived up to his peak production. Kinsler has benefited over his career from playing in Texas, a hitter's haven; his offense may well take a sharp drop between a less hospitable home park and advancing age. (Kinsler for his career in Texas: .304/.387/.511; elsewhere, .242/.312/.399.)

One wonders if the tradeoff of offense for defense is deliberate, or if it just happened as the Tigers sought more payroll flexibility. This projected 2014 infield wouldn't produce runs as the 2013 infield did, but the Tigers should be better with the glove at each position.

Jhonny Peralta isn't a particularly rangy shortstop,
but he's a better hitter than most shortstops.

I am far from convinced that the better defense will adequately compensate for the decrease in runs. I specifically doubt that Iglesias is a overall step up from Peralta (although he will be considerably less expensive, which will allow resources to be diverted to other needs).

Kinsler has been a top-of-the-order hitter for Texas; Infante hit at the bottom of the Tigers order. I'm curious about how new manager Brad Ausmus will handle this. The Tigers lost their cleanup hitter; will Ausmus move Torii Hunter out of the second slot to hit fourth or fifth and install Kinsler in the two-hole?

Jim Leyland retires. Again

Jim Leyland: 22 years as a manager, 1,769 wins, 1,728
losses, one World Series title, three pennants, six
division titles.

Jim Leyland announced Monday that he's walking away from the managerial job in Detroit.

This is his second retirement — he hung 'em up, so he said, when he decided he'd had enough in Colorado back in 1999. He was 54 then, 54 and frustrated after losing 198 games in two years. He's 68 now and has won three straight division titles. I think this one will stick — and for that matter, the first stuck for seven years.

There are now, oddly, three managerial openings for teams in "win-now" position: Detroit, Cincinnati and Washington.

I would expect the Tigers to view this as a short-term opening. The youngest of the 12 players who got the most plate appearances on the 2013 Tigers was 26. Miguel Cabrera is now on the wrong side of 30. Prince Fielder's numbers have fallen each of the last two years. Alex Avila has been ridden hard behind the plate.

This is not, in my mind, a team to be turned over to a managerial prospect with a learning curve.

One issue that the new manager, whoever he is, will have to deal with is the bullpen. Leyland's patchwork failed him this month. That might be relatively prominent on Dave Dombrowski's checklist as the Detroit general manager seeks a new dugout boss.

Let's see: Experienced manager for a veteran squad with a knack for assembling and deploying a bullpen. I know just the man. But Ron Gardenhire already has a job.

Contemplating a bullpen meltdown

Beginning the meltdown: Jim Leyland
sends Jose Veras back to the dughout and
awaits the arrival of Drew Smyly.

Back in 2008, when this blog was on a different and far less useful (or searchable) platform on the Free Press website, I started tracking the Twins' multi-pitcher bullpen meltdowns.

Do you remember that season? The Twins wound up losing the division title in a Game 163, but had the bullpen not coughed up a number of big leads, that game wouldn't have been necessary. I can't readily find my tally from that season, but I believe the Twins lost at least four games that year when the starter left with at least a three-run lead and at least three relievers combined to allow a crooked number inning.

The frustration of that season reverberated Sunday night as the Tigers bullpen melted down in the eighth inning. Four relievers combined for 25 pitches and four runs in that frame as Jim Leyland searched for the outs he needed:

• Jose Veras got Stephen Drew to ground out, then allowed a double to Will Middlebrooks.
• Drew Smyly entered, walked Jacoby Ellsbury.
• Al Alburquerque entered, struck out Shane Victorino, then allowed a single to Dustin Pedroia.
• Joaquin Benoit entered, gave up a home run to David Ortiz.

Enter pitcher No. 5 for the game, and No. 4 for the
eighth inning. Exit, one pitch later, the lead.

And a 5-1 lead turned into a 5-5 tie.

All this matchup playing pretty much follows current managerial convention, except that I doubt that in the regular season Leyland would have used Benoit, his closer, to try to get that last out. Regular-season Leyland might have deployed Phil Coke instead (even though Coke isn't really a lefty killer and Benoit actually has better numbers against lefties.)

It all reminded me, as I say, of Ron Gardenhire's struggles in 2008 (which were, frankly, somewhat self-inflicted; Gardy simply would not use Craig Breslow in game situations and spent months trying to get big outs from Brian Bass, who had no big outs in him).

But it also reminded me of how much the game has changed since I started my fandom in 1969. Managers of my youth didn't indulge in this kind of pitcher shuffling.

In the baseball of my youth — even the baseball of my young adulthood — Max Scherzer doesn't come out of the game after seven innings. Two hits and one run allowed in seven innings? Managers in the 1970s and long into the 1980s would have kept him in the game. I can't imagine Earl Weaver or Walter Alston pulling a 21-game winner pre-emptively like that. They may or may not have been aware of pitch counts (Scherzer was at 108), but they didn't manage with that in the forefront of their minds.

And even if they had felt it best to go to the pen, they wouldn't have made repeated moves. Most likely Benoit, as the best reliever on the staff, would have gotten the call and told to get six outs.

This stuff didn't become managerial convention until the late 1980s and early '90s. The managers who did the most to make it convention were Tony LaRussa and ... yes, LaRussa's buddy, Jim Leyland, who was then managing the Pirates.

If Leyland appeared a slave to managerial convention Sunday night, it's appropriate. He helped create that convention more than 20 years ago.

The return of Valverde

Jose Valverde in his return to the Tigers.

In Wednesday's post I commented on the return of Jose Valverde to the closer's role in Detroit and predicted it would be short-lived.

That night, "Papa Grande" picked up the save with a 1-2-3 ninth inning against Kansas City, two flies to left sandwiched around a ground ball out. Eighteen pitches, 11 strikes. Not dominating, and only one inning, but certainly nothing to send manager Jim Leyland climbing the walls.

The new two-tone goatee might, though. Blond on the right side, brunette on the left. Even though Valverde has apparently ditched his trademark goggles, he still knows how to make a spectacle of himself.

Around the division: Detroit Tigers

I am perversely fascinated by the thrashing-about of the Detroit Tigers when it comes to the back end of its bullpen.

In most regards, the Tigers look like the best team in the American League. They have a potent middle of the lineup, a good outfield defense, the best rotation in the league. For flaws — and all teams have flaws — there's this: the left side of the infield has no range, and manager Jim Leyland is excessively indecisive with his closer options.

How indecisive? On Tuesday the Tigers brought back Jose Valverde and anointed him closer. This is the same Valverde who spent 2012 skimming the edge of disaster and then went over the edge in the postseason, the same Valverde the Tigers refused to re-sign during the offseason.

The Tigers went into training camp hoping that prospect Bruce Rondon would seize the job. He didn't. They shipped Rondon to Triple A to start the season and announced that they would go with a "closer by committee." Which they didn't really do. First Leyland tried for force Phil Coke into the role, then Joaquin Benoit.

And they signed Valverde, unwanted by anybody else in baseball, to a minor-league contract.

And now Valverde's back — and Rondon has been called up as well.

Saying that Valverde has the closers job doesn't carry much weight right now. Leyland's previous statements of intent were either insincere or insecure. The Jose Valverde we last saw didn't deserve this opportunity, and his leash figures to be very short indeed.

A short leash is deserved in his case. The problem is, Leyland doesn't really trust anybody in his bullpen with the ninth inning. Not Coke, not Benoit, not Rondon, not Al Alburquerque ... and, odds are, soon not Valverde either.

Not a true "closer by committee"

Joaquin Benoit leaves the mound in the
ninth inning Wednesday.

The Detroit Tigers had opportunities during the offseason to add a "proven closer" to their roster. They chose not to.

When prospect Bruce Rondon failed to establish himself during spring training, general manager Dave Dombrowski was fairly emphatic — the Tigers would eschew the now standard bullpen approach of designating a "closer" whose role would be to pitch the ninth inning in save situations.
They would use the so-called "committee" approach, mixing their right-handed power arms (Joaquin Benoit, Octavio Dotel, Al Alberquerque) with lefty Phil Coke and looking to exploit matchups.

So Dombrowski said. But he's not the guy in the dugout making the in-game decisions. Jim Leyland is. And while Leyland successfully manipulated just this kind of bullpen 20-some years ago in Pittsburgh, he's been a designated-closer guy since.

And his handling of the bullpen in the first two games this season says Coke is his closer.

The Twins used the same lineup in the first two games of the season, and it is reasonable to believe it will be the default lineup for the year. For opposition managers looking to exploit matchups, it's basically two parts — use a lefty for the 2-through-5 slots (Joe Mauer, Josh Willingham, Justin Morneau and Ryan Doumit), use a righty for the 6-through-1 (Trevor Plouffe, Chris Parmelee, Brian Dozier, Pedro Florimon, Aaron Hicks). One could go lefty through Plouffe-Parmelee as well.

In the opener, Benoit got the bottom of the order in the eighth — Dozier, Eduardo Escobar (in for Florimon) and Hicks, and Coke dealt with the lefty-heavy middle of the lineup in the ninth.The matchups worked.

On Wednesday, the matchups went the other way, but Leyland used Benoit in the eighth against the middle of the lineup. He successfully navigated that inning, but walked Plouffe to open the ninth — and in came Coke to face Parmelee, a one-batter matchup advantage.

He got Parmelee, but that was the last out the Tigers got. Dozier singled, Escobar doubled, and the Twins had an unlikely 3-2 win.

If Leyland were truly going for matchups with his bullpen, Coke should have gotten the eighth and a right-hander the ninth. But he appears to really want have Coke lay claim to the ninth inning.

The bullpen is the most obvious question on what appears to be a very loaded Detroit squad. Coke may have the emotional makeup managers like to see in a closer, but he's always struggled against right-handed hitters. We'll see how stubborn Leyland is about this as time goes on — and how much pressure builds on Dombrowski to provide an easy out for the manager.

When there's no clear Plan B

Bruce Rondon may be Plan A
for the back end of the Detroit
bullpen, but his spring training
has not gone well so far.

More than three weeks remain before the regular season opens, but a couple of high-expectation teams have developed significant roster questions that don't have easy answers. It will be interesting to see how they cope.

Detroit Tigers: Jose Valverde, who had been their closer the past few years, is out of the picture (and still unemployed, for that matter). Bruce Rondon, a hard-throwing 22-year-old prospect, had been deemed the front-runner as Valverde's successor, although manager Jim Leyland was coy during the offseason about the bullpen glory job.

Rondon has struggled with command this spring. The Tigers skipped his most recent scheduled appearance to work on his mechanics in a side session and pronounced themselves pleased with the tweaks, but we've all seen reports of struggling pitchers having a "great bullpen session" and continuing to struggle.

Maybe Rondon can be fixed in the time remaining. Maybe the Tigers will make a March trade — there's plenty of speculation about the availability of starter Rick Porcello. Perhaps they'll open the season counting on Leyland to work the closer-by-committee approach that worked so well for him in his Pittsburgh days more than 20 years ago.

Mark Teixeira didn't spend a lot of
time in a Team USA uniform this week.
He's been replaced on the roster by
Eric Hosmer of Kansas City.

New York Yankees: First baseman Mark Teixeira injured his wrist hitting off a tee shortly after joining Team USA in preparation for the World Baseball Classic, and he'll be out of action eight to 10 weeks, or into May — a rather similar return date to that of outfielder Curtis Granderson, who broke his forearm in his first exhibition at-bat.

Tex, Grandy, Alex Rodriguez — the Yankees have more than $60 million in salaries already destined for the disabled list on Opening Day, or roughly twice the Houston Astros' projected payroll. (Heck, even general manager Brian Cashman broke a leg and dislocated an ankle skydiving for a veterans charity.)

If you're going to lose lineup keys for eight weeks, it's just as well that a sizable chuck of that time be spring training. But that's a lot of power suddenly vanished from the Yankee lineup for at least a month.

This being the Yankees, there's a lot of speculation that  Cashman will acquire a veteran. Which brought on this tweet Wednesday from the Daily News' Mark Feinsand:

Cashman said NYY could look at a pool of 1B and 3B thanks to (Kevin) Youkliis' versatility: "It's kind of like a baby pool. A lot of kids pee in it."

Ah, lemme guess: He's not that thrilled with the options outside the Yankees system either.

AL Central: Going all festival

The Twins weren't the only major league team holding a promotional "fest" last weekend -- with the offweek in the NFL playoffs, it was a good opportunity to get some headlines and remind fans that spring training is just a couple of weeks away.

Around the division's fan fests:

Detroit: Perhaps the biggest question for the Tigers is: Who closes? Jim Leyland, the manager, had an amusing answer and a more sincere one, and the sincere one can be found in the link: Prospect Bruce Rondon is the leading candidate, but Leyland wants to get a sense of his makeup before committing to the kid in the ninth inning.

But I liked this one, from the first day of Tigerfest: This is why I like these forums, so I can think about these things. I don't know what I'm going to do.

Chicago: The ghost of A.J. Pierzynski, who signed with Texas as a free agent, apparently haunted Soxfest. That's understandable: Pierzynski has been a durable, productive catcher who fit well with the South Siders self-image, and nobody really knows what to expect of Tyler Flowers, the heir apparent.

I understand why the Sox let A.J. go. He's in his mid-30s, and he has a lot of mileage on his tires. Catchers typically don't last as long as he has. But I expect the Sox will miss him a great deal. 

Kansas City: Actually held its fanfest the previous week. The Royals, who've been compiling a lineup of talented young position players, were rather aggressive about getting starting pitchers -- Jamie Shields, Jeremy Guthrie, Edwin Santana, Wade Davis -- and the organization obviously wants to make its move up the standings now.

I have the sense that the K.C. fan base isn't fully buying it.

Cleveland: Also held its Tribefest the previous week. Hey: Terry Francona! Nick Swisher! A couple of new names the casual fan knows! 

The offseason move that matters most was probably trading for pitching prospect Trevor Bauer, but that's not the kind of guy who packs the autograph lines.

Around the Division: Detroit Tigers

The Tigers traded for Anibal Sanchez in midseason.
He went 4-6, 3.74 in the regular season and 1-2, 1.77
in the postseason.

As has been the case in recent years, the Detroit Tigers have spent some serious money this offseason.

Torii Hunter, cast loose by the Angels, landed in the D last month on a two-year, $26 million deal. While the erstwhile Twin has been better in his 30s than I expected, that's a pretty fat salary for a 37-year-old outfielder.

And last week the Tigers outbid the Cubs for the services of pitcher Anibal Sanchez. If the Hunter salary seemed generous, Sanchez' is something closer to excessive: six years, $80 million. For a guy with two winning seasons out of seven, who has never pitched 200 (regular season) innings, who figures to be the fourth man in the rotation.

Sanchez is talented, but the results have never matched the talent.

The signing leaves the Tigers with six starters for their rotation. The odd man out figures to be Rick Porcello, whose pitch-to-contact style is less than a perfect fit with the Tigers' porous infield defense. Drew Smyly, a left-hander, gets strikeouts. And the Tigers could use a southpaw in the rotation.

So Porcello is likely to be peddled, and some early speculation has linked him to the Angels (for an outfielder) and Pirates (for a closer). I wouldn't be stunned if his destination turned out to be the Cubs in a deal involving Alfonso Soriano. This Detroit blog post even mentions the Twins as a potential trading partner, although I don't think that's likely.

Anyway, the Tigers have won the last two AL Central titles and seem well positioned for a third, even if their infield is regularly mystified by the process of turning a double play. They have the best rotation in the division, maybe the best in baseball -- if Porcello is traded to the Twins, he'd be their most logical Opening Day starter -- they have some hammers in the middle of the lineup; they have some heat in the bullpen; and they've improved the outfield defense.

I have a post in the works on how local cable revenues are fueling the overall increase in free-agent pay and how that leaves the Twins lagging, but in the case of the Tigers, it's not TV money getting spent. It's that Mike Ilitch is 83 and worth some $2.7 billion (according to Forbes), and he's decided that he'd rather die with a World Series parade than with $2.7 billion.

What happens to that "business model" when Ilitch does die and his heirs get to decide if they want to continue to divert resources to a vanity investment is a fair question -- and one that will be answered at some future date.

Around the division: Detroit Tigers

Delmon Young, erstwhile Minnesota Twin, was probably still circling the bases with his game-tying homer in the final game of the World Series when one of my tweeps opined that he'd just won a multi-year deal that the signing team would regret by the middle of April.

Maybe so. But if so, it won't be with Detroit. David Dombrowski said Tuesday the Tigers would not re-sign Young or closer Jose Valverde.

Delmon Young was 15-for-54 in the postseason, with
three home runs and a .481 slugging percentage.

These are decisions based not on October heroics (Young) or failures (Valverde), but on clear-headed evaluation of the players' abilities — and the ability of the organization to replace them.

Young for the season hit .267/.296/.411, which isn't acceptable production from a designated hitter, and that outweighs the impressive numbers he's put up in the past two postseasons. Besides, the Tigers have Victor Martinez returning next year from his knee reconstruction, and V-Mart's catching days are almost certainly over. There's no room at the DH inn for Young, and his outfielding "skills" aren't helping him either.

(Martinez is a better hitter than Young, but man, that figures to be a painfully slow relay team in the middle of the Detroit batting order — Miguel Cabrera, Prince Fielder, and Martinez.)

Valverde had a rocky 2012 in general — his ERA rose from 2.24 in 2011 to 3.78 — and he absolutely fell apart in the playoffs (2.2 innings, nine runs, all earned).

The Tigers probably feel that they got away with one here, that Papa Grande was on the brink of collapse all season and finally did so at the end.

Dombrowski spoke of prospect Bruce Rondon as a possible successor in the glory job. The Tigers have certainly been more aggressive about promoting prospects than the Twins are, so it's a genuine possibility.

But I wouldn't be surprised if the Tigers threw more of owner Mike Ilitch's money at a veteran. It just won't be Valverde.

Pic of the Week

Miguel Cabrera contemplates the plight of his
Detroit Tigers team during the ninth inning of
Game Three — the second straight shutout defeat
for the American League representatives.

Miguel Cabrera had a single Saturday in Game 3 of the World Series. But in what may have been the single most crucial at-bat of the series — bases loaded, two out, Cabrera against Ryan Vogelsong in the  bottom of the fifth inning — Miggy popped up harmlessly.

The Triple Crown winner hasn't done much at the plate. Neither have his teammates. Through three games, the Tigers have yet to take the lead. They've scored three runs, all in the first game, and two of them in a garbage time ninth inning that they entered trailing 8-1.

But Cabrera is the big man, the figure everybody's looking to, and his response Saturday night wasn't good — he fled the stadium after the game and avoided the media.

The Giants are up 3-0 in the series, and they haven't played their ace — Matt Cain — yet. That comes tonight.