If you’re new here and like what you see, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Need more info on what subscribing entails? Here’s a primer. Thanks for visiting!Realish, live, Tigers baseball today. It’s the annual spring training kickoff against Florida Southern. The game is 1:05pm. Todd Jones [...]

credit Roger DeWitt

I’d consider this the first bit of surprising news coming out of camp, but the Tigers are impressed with Miguel Cabrera defensively at third has had me a little nervous since the trade was made. A rotation with three southpaws, two of which are extreme ground balls pitchers, means that third base becomes very important. Whether or not this is spring-training optimism talking remains to be seen (Jose Macias was dubbed a gold glove centerfielder by Randy Smith one spring).

Full squad workouts are now underway.  Before you know it we’ll have the first pitch of the Florida Southern game.  But for now, here’s a summary of the day’s stories out of Lakeland:

Imagine if the players turned the tables on the beat writers during spring training and wrote stories about the beat writers.

“The official reporting date wasn’t until the 14th, but he was down here a couple weeks ago getting ready.”

“You can tell he was really working out this offseason. His vocabulary has grown as much as his forearms. Both are the product of intensive typing.”

“He’s excited to be down here. You can hear it in his voice when he talks about how excited he is to get to work.”

“As the new guy on the beat, he’s still trying to get a feel for his fellow media members, but he seems to be fitting in great.”

“As a 6 year veteran, and the only remaining beat writer from that awful 2003 team, it’s clear that he’s a leader in and out of the locker room and the other guys look to him for cues.”

“He’s excited to try out the new language he was working on over the winter. By adding Spanish to his repertoire he should really have an advantage over the competition. If he can gain confidence in it, it could be what he needs to push him from beat writer to elite columnist.”

I kid of course, especially on a day when there is so much news coming out of camp.

credit Roger DeWitt
The first day of official workouts. Now we’re rolling.
Link round up
Catching up with Inge - Detroit Tigers Insider - MLive.comA TALE OF TWO CATCHERSJim Leyland addresses Brandon Inge’s future with TigersLeyland isn’t concerned about lineup, is concerned about bullpenThe Official Site of The Detroit Tigers: News: Notes: Porcello gets first [...]

While today was officially “Pitchers and Catchers report” day, it was just that. Reporting day. The official workouts don’t begin until tomorrow. Still, the players and beat writers are all in town so the stream of news has started to flow.

The links to the stories are below with my comments to follow:

Photo Credit Roger DeWitt

This picture has nothing to do with the links in the post. I just really liked it. Notice the high socks on Jeremy Bonderman. That has to bode well for the upcoming season. You can see more pictures from Lakeland at both Roger DeWitt’s Flickr page and the [...]

If you peruse the Tigers spring training stats, you’ll see a roster full of guys with some pretty impressive numbers. Sure, Carlos Guillen is slumping a little but his 8:6 K:BB ratio is still favorable. But if you look at Omar Infante this spring, there isn’t much to like.
Infante has a 172/179/250 line [...]

The Tigers optioned Mike Rabelo and Brent Clevlen to AAA Toledo. There was some question (at least in my mind) whether they would have Clevlen repeat AA given his struggles last year. I wonder if this is any indication that they may be moving Cameron Maybin to Erie to start the year.
The Tigers [...]

It’s is split squad action today. It also marks the first telecast of the year on FSN which will have the D-rays and Tigers. Meanwhile, WXYT will have the radio of the Tigers and Braves game.
Nate Robertson will be the starter in the Devil Rays game and Zach Miner will start [...]

The Tigers trimmed 8 players from big league camp: righthanded pitchers Jordan Tata and Virgil Vasquez to Triple A Toledo, righthanded pitchers Eulogio De La Cruz and Kyle Sleeth to Double A Erie and lefthanded pitcher Andrew Miller to Single A Lakeland. Additionally, the club assigned righthanded pitcher Jair Jurrjens and catchers Gabe Johnson [...]

Similar to yesterdays look at interesting offensive stats, now we’ll look at the pitchers. Also like yesterday, I’m not drawing real conclusions or deriving meaning, just making observation.
Beginning at the end
The big 3 at the back end of the Tigers bullpen are off to a good start. Joel Zumaya, Fernando Rodney, and Todd [...]