That’s a brave minority. I’ll tell you how my thoughts on it have traveled.

CABRERA TRADE: Wow! OK, Inge is gone.
SPRING TRAINING: OK, Inge isn’t gone. Sub? Fine.
SEASON BEGINS: Um… were the scouts wrong? Are they sure Cabrera has ever played 3B? But hey – he’ll get better, and the bat will be worth the wait.
THE SWITCH: Huh? Playing devil’s advocate, I theorize that hatred for Inge’s bat in a hit-or-die strategy must be the reason. OK, fine.
GUILLEN’S EARLY DAYS AT 3B: OK. not fine. The switch was a misguided disaster.
JACQUE’S DEPARTURE: OK, now the Tiger’s can afford to carry Inge’s bat in exchange for defense. Inge at 3B. please.

With a little foresight and planning, all of this could have been avoided. Cabrera could have been groomed for 1B from the get-go (Leyland’s “history of baseball” must not have been written until this April). Guillen was clearly the bat that didn’t belong on the field, nothing new there. Sheffield wanted to play in the field, also nothing new. Inge could have kept his job and the Tigers could have skipped all the angst over his contract and a trade. No platoon partner needed in LF, thus no J. jones, thus the team would not have been limited to outfielders in seeking a lefty bat. Thames could have gotten plenty of work just spelling Ordonez and filling in for Sheffield, and even backing up Cabrera.

Granted, I say this now, in hindsight. But these are all things the Tigers could have considered well before spring training. What prevented it? Lack of confidence that Sheffield could be an everyday LF? Guillen’s reluctance to go to DH? Desire to appease Cabrera by saying “but of course we want you at 3B”? An early Inge-has- got-to-go decision the Tigers bound themselves to before waking up to the fact that he was untradeable?

I don’t know. But the whole thing reeks of bad planning, or at least precarious and untenable plans. That’s not an entirely original opinion of mine – someone else here said much the same a while back (stand up and take credit), and now I agree.

If the Tigers turn it around, I say everyone else should take a crack at rewriting a happier version of the tune.

-Sam