sean casey | ALDLAND

Al Avila was busy yesterday. First, he traded Justin Upton to the Angels. Then, reportedly with seconds to go before the midnight waiver/postseason trade deadline, he traded Justin Verlander to the Astros. Through yesterday, Upton and Verlander were the 2017 team’s most valuable players according to bWAR. The Verlander Era– the 2006-2016 run of competitiveness– officially is over, and there can be no doubt that the Detroit Tigers are in full teardown mode. With that in mind, here‘s an updated look at the team’s 2018 financial situation:

tigers2018financials as of 9-1-17

With Verlander and Upton out, the top of that ledger is significantly lighter, and that trend is likely to continue into the offseason, when the team will trade Ian Kinsler and decline to exercise their option on Anibal Sanchez. They’ll still owe Verlander $8 million next year under the terms of the trade with Houston, and there will be raises due to a number of their arbitration-eligible players (Nicholas Castellanos likely being first among that cohort, followed by Jose Iglesias, Shane Greene, and perhaps Alex Wilson), but Detroit’s front office should be feeling much lighter on its feet. As I’ve mentioned again recently, there also should be a revenue bump from a new TV deal next year.

As Motown turns its increasingly lonely baseball eyes toward the future, where it will be incumbent upon Avila and his team to convert these more liquid resources into a new competitive core, let’s take another moment to look back at the really great era of Tigers baseball that began with Verlander’s first full MLB season in 2006. Here‘s the forty-man roster from that team, which represented the American League in the World Series that year (ages and positions shown for 2006 season):

tigers2018financials as of 9-1-17

Of this group, one is in the hall of fame (Ivan Rodriguez), and at least two are working in baseball broadcasting (Craig Monroe, FSD; Sean Casey, MLB Network). Only Verlander, Curtis Granderson (Dodgers), Fernando Rodney (Diamondbacks), Andrew Miller (Indians), and Jason Grilli (Blue Jays) still play in the majors, and Verlander was, by far, the last of the 2006 crew to leave Detroit.

You can read plenty about the prospect returns the Tigers received from yesterday’s trades elsewhere on the web. Here‘s an initial snapshot to get you started.

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Previously
It’s Over – 9/1
Upton There – 8/31
A bad time for a bad season – 8/29
Jordan Zimmermann takes tennis lessons – 8/20
Tigers Notes, 8/8/17 – 8/8
Decoding the Upton Myth – 8/2
Even the umpires just wanna go home – 7/21
Yo, a J.D. Martinez trade comp – 7/19
Martinez trade triggers premature referendum on Avila – 7/19
Michael Fulmer has righted the ship – 6/27
Tigers in Retrograde – 6/19
Fixing Justin Upton – 5/31
Soft in the Middle Now – 5/30
Reliever Relief, Part 2 – 5/11
Reliever Relief – 5/8

I started writing about the Baseball Hall of Fame even before we started ALDLAND (see also here and here), and the issues and conversations surrounding Cooperstown and the process by which players are chosen to be enshrined there often lack basic elements of reason and logic.

Briefly, membership in the Hall is regulated by a group of writers who are affiliated with the Baseball Writers’ Association of America who enforce unwritten rules and take self-aggrandizing positions in a way that makes Brian McCann look progressive and relaxed.

Today, Deadspin announced that it has broken the mold: an eligible voter agreed to sell Deadspin his or her vote. The site now is in the process of determining how it, and its readers, will cast that ballot, which was released today. In the meantime, the site is trying to buy more votes.

For someone else’s thoughts on what this means, click here.

I don’t know that the predominant basis of the HOF selection process should be a popular vote. After all, we see that on a small scale every year in the All-Star Game balloting, which leads to ridiculous and deeply uninformed outcomes. I do think it’s okay to mix things up a little bit, though.

I might write more about the names on this year’s ballot at a later date– it’s sort of interesting to see the number of hilarious former Tigers, including Todd Jones, Sean Casey, and Kenny Rogers, alongside the great Alan Trammell, on the list– but I’m not really qualified to do that.

At the very least, we now can say that Cooperstown is Y2K compatible. Whether that will or should change anything about the place, and how this real-life experiment will unfold, are other questions.

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Tag Archives: sean casey

Saving Detroit: An updated look at 2018 (and a quick check on 2006)

The Baseball Hall of Fame, Deadspin, the Third Rail, and the Fourth Wall