Category Archives: 2010 Season

What I Think About the 2010 Season

I’m not going to do a big prediction post this season. I did make some predictions for Baseball Daily Digest. I have the Tigers finishing second behind the Twins, and pretty much have the AL Central finishing the same as last season. I think the Tigers are about an 82-83 win team with enough upside and risk that the basement and first place are both within reach in a narrow division.

Having said that, here are some thoughts (almost like predictions) about what we’ll see this season from Detroit.

  • Scott Sizemore will succeed. I’m not predicting ROY awards (though I wouldn’t be shocked) but he’ll hit well enough that his average fielding won’t be an issue. Plus he’ll say the right things and do all those little things that are so popular that fans will love him.
  • Magglio Ordonez’s contract will be an issue once again this season as he approaches his vesting milestones. He’ll hit over .300 and be productive enough that cutting him won’t be a viable option.
  • The Tigers will use at least 9 starters this year.
  • Andy Oliver might not be one of those starters, but I bet he sees big league innings this year.
  • Clete Thomas is the first Mud Hen to be called up.
  • Adam Everett will struggle with the stick (even for his standards) and there will be calls for Brent Dlugach by mid May.
  • Jeremy Bonderman gets more starts than Dontrelle Willis
  • Verlander wins the Cy Young award

Opening Day Link Round Up

It’s finally here. Real Tigers baseball again for the first time since game 163. Here are some items of interest that may help you get ready for today:

Opening Day Mega Chat Extravaganza

Please join myself and a significant chunk of the Tigers blogosphere for a live chat today at 3 p.m. It looks like we’ll have a dozen (or more, the responses keep coming in) bloggers and Tigers writers stopping by in the hour leading up to the first pitch of the Detroit Tigers’ 2010 season. You may remember we did this once before at the trade deadline and despite the chaos and moderating challenges, it was also a lot of fun.

Minor League Rosters Announced

The Tigers organization made the official announcements of their minor league rosters today. The rosters below were compiled from posts at TigsTown (and Mark Anderson – @TigsTownMark), Motown Sports, and Nick Underhill’s site.

A couple of things worth calling out:

  • Audy Ciriaco and Cody Satterwhite are both starting their seasons on the DL. In Satterwhite’s case it is a torn labrum.  While I don’t know the severity this is often a career-altering type of injury.
  • 2009 second round pick Andy Oliver will receive the aggressive assignment to AA meaning he has a chance to see time with the big league club in 2010.
  • Another 2009 pitcher, Adam Wilk will be pushed to Lakeland after successful stints at the lower rungs in his debut year.
  • The Toledo team is pretty stacked and the infield and outfield should provide some exciting nights at Fifth-Third field. That crowded outfield forced Ramirez to Erie even though he spent last season at AAA. Jason Beck notes that he will get the bulk of his reps in centerfield so the move may me as much about defense as offense.
  • Take 75 North and TigsTown both covered some of the cuts/retirements that are a little surprising including Brett Jensen and Jordan Newton.

Continue reading Minor League Rosters Announced

Opening Day Still a Hot Ticket

In Detroit we take great pride in the festive atmosphere that surrounds Opening Day. It really is a Detroit holiday and there are often claims that we have the best Opening Day in baseball. The game is always a sellout, and thousands more that don’t have tickets still make the trek. It appears that even with a down economy and a team with questionable prospects that the secondary market is booming for tickets in 2010.

SeatGeek, a site that monitors the secondary market for sports tickets issued a report and the Tigers-Indians game on April 9th is the fourth priciest MLB ticket on the market at $141. It trails only the Yankees opener, a Yankees-Red Sox match-up, and the Minnesota Twins opening of Target field.  But other Tigers tickets are down 15% compared to the second half of 2009. Part of that could be seasonal impact as well.

On Stubhub Opening Day tickets are starting at $99 for standing room and you’ll need to go over $125 to get an actual seat.

Do you have tickets for the opener yet, do you plan on heading down?

Robertson traded

Jeremy Bonderman and Dontrelle Willis have secured the final two spots in the Tigers rotation, and Nate Robertson secured a spot with the Marlins. The Tigers today traded Robertson and $9.6 million of his $10 million contract for Marlins left handed prospect Jay Voss. For my thoughts on the trade, well, just look back a couple days.

Robertson outpitched his two competitors not only this spring, but last year as well. The stats say that Robertson should be in the rotation. It has to be a tough pill for Robertson to swallow.*

Continue reading Robertson traded

It’s Kelly right?

Yesterday Jim Leyland dropped some hints as to what his preferred 25 man roster would be when the team breaks camp this week. Actually he’s been dropping hints all along but he certainly helped to remove some doubt yesterday. It appears that Don Kelly will be the last position player on the roster.

Leyland offered reporters up this nugget:

I’ll give you one hint: ‘If Larish could play center field, his chances would be better.’

Which certainly hurts Jeff Larish’s chances of making the team. And I read it like Lee does that the preferred candidate be able to play both infield and outfield. This likely becomes more important as Leyland states his intention of resting Brandon Inge early in the season and the team’s questioned (and answered) level of comfort in Scott Sizemore.

Continue reading It’s Kelly right?

Putting eggs in the Willis basket

The battle for the back end of the Tigers starting rotation has been the story of the spring for Detroit fans. The Tigers are counting on two of the Jeremy Bonderman – Nate Robertson – Dontrelle Willis trio to bill out the last 40% of the starters innings. Bonderman has pretty much had the 4th spot assured leaving Robertson and Willis battling for the 5th spot. But with Robertson outpitching Willis by most measures, it appears that Robertson is on the block and Willis has that  last spot. A dangerous proposition to say the least.

Continue reading Putting eggs in the Willis basket

Seay, Miner hit the DL

The Tigers trimmed their roster down to 32 this morning with a couple of disabled list moves and other cuts. Most notable was the placement of Bobby Seay and Zach Miner on the 15 day disabled list.

Seay has been traveling from doctor to doctor in search of a diagnosis on his balky left arm (UPDATE: It’s a torn rotator cuff. There’s more info at the bottom of the post). Miner’s malady seems less dire but he won’t be ready for the beginning of the season. The moves do open up two spots on the active roster.

Miner’s long relief role could be the destination for the loser of the Nate Robertson-Dontrelle Willis-Jeremy Bonderman battle (assuming Robertson doesn’t get traded). Right handed reliever Robbie Weinhardt also remains in camp meaning he still has a shot. On the left side of things it would see to boost Brad Thomas’ chances of heading to Kansas City for the opener.

Daniel Schlereth, one of the lefties looking for a spot in the pen, was among those cut today. Scherleth was optioned along with Wilkin Ramirez to Toledo. Enrique Gonzalez, Phil Dumatrait, and Max St. Pierre were sent to minor league camp.

UPDATE: The injury to Bobby Seay is a torn rotator cuff. The plan is for Seay to try and rehab the injury and avoid surgery if at all possible. While the Tigers have other lefty options, it really is a blow to Seay who is a free agent after this year and will likely have his open market value severely hampered due to the injury.

Damon and his homers

Much has been made about Johnny Damon’s offensive numbers being inflated by the new Yankee Stadium. Damon matched his career high of 24 homers last year at the age of 36. He also posted the highest slugging percentage of his career and with 17 of his homers coming at home he clearly benefitted from the short porch. How might the move to a much more spacious Comerica Park effect Damon’s 2010 production?

Using the ever-valuable Hit Tracker we can see exactly where each of Damon’s homers landed in 2009. But with a little image manipulation we can overlay Damon’s homer onto Comerica Park’s dimensions and get a feel for the impact of his new home park would have on his production.

Continue reading Damon and his homers

Because the centerfielder has to leadoff

With spring training underway there has been a flood of news bubbling up from Lakeland (and of course there are those pesky Johnny Damon rumors). But one that caught my eye was Jim Leyland’s dismissal of Scott Sizemore as the number two hitter. Somewhat understandably I suppose he doesn’t want rookies batting in the top two spots . But why pencil in Austin Jackson as the leadoff hitter in the first place?

Jackson certainly has a number of tools and is deservedly ranked on many top 100 prospect lists. Plate discipline hasn’t been one of those strengths though. He has a respectable .356 OBP as a minor leaguer, but he also fanned 2.3 times for every walk he took.

Sizemore’s greatest asset is his bat. He has maintained a .383 OBP throughout his minor league career supported by a .305 batting average and drawing walks in 13% of his plate appearances. His K/BB ratio is 1.3.

I won’t pretend to know who will have the better season and who will adjust quicker to big league pitching.  But based on all the available data it would point to Sizemore having the better chance at putting up at least a league average on base percentage. The difference though in Jim Leyland’s mind is that Jackson plays center and accordingly he should hit leadoff so he can make things happen.

I couch this all in the fact that I don’t really believe lineups make that big of a difference, and Leyland’s quotes on pitcher and catcher reporting day probably mean even less. But it a suspicious thought process where Jackson has the leadoff spot to lose while Sizemore is pushed to the lower rungs of the lineup.

Photo Credit: Roger DeWitt (hueytaxi on Flickr)