DETROIT – The MLB postseason starts today, and for the ninth year in a row, the Detroit Tigers will not participate.
I can’t in good conscious call the 2023 season a success. The Tigers finished with a losing record for the seventh-straight year and spent the final three months completely out of the playoff race. But there were still positives, both from team and individual perspectives.
Here are some reasons to be excited going into the offseason:
Tarik Skubal returns to ace form
The most disappointing part of the Tigers’ 2022 season wasn’t that they missed the playoffs or wasted so much money on Javier Baez. It was that Skubal suffered a long-term injury in the midst of what appeared to be a true ace turn.
It’s hard to compete for a playoff spot in MLB without at least one ace in the starting rotation. The Tigers haven’t really had that luxury since trading Justin Verlander to the Houston Astros in 2017.
Skubal appeared well on his way midway through last year before an injury on Aug. 1 not only knocked him out for the final two months of 2022, but also the entire first half of 2023.
You never know how a pitcher is going to return from an injury like that, but it sure looks like the Tigers and Skubal got a best-case outcome.
If Skubal’s production from this season spanned 160 innings instead of 80, he probably would have finished second to Gerrit Cole in the AL Cy Young race.
The surface numbers are phenomenal: a 2.80 ERA, 0.90 WHIP, and 11.4 strikeouts per nine innings. Among qualified pitchers in the AL, he would have finished third in ERA, first in WHIP, and second in strikeout rate.
But what’s even more encouraging about Skubal’s season are the underlying numbers. By every metric that’s actually within a pitcher’s control, Skubal was elite.
His 2.27 xERA (expected ERA based on strikeouts, walks, home runs, and quality of contact) ranked best in MLB. He finished in the 95th percentile or better in each of xBA, strikeout percentage, and walk percentage.
His 51.8% ground ball rate is almost unheard of for a pitcher who can get so many swings and misses up in the zone, and while the hard-hit and average exit velocity numbers are about average, so many of those batted balls are on the ground that Skubal ranked in the 94th percentile in opponent barrel rate.
A pitcher with an elite strikeout rate who doesn’t walk batters and gets a ton of ground balls? Skubal was basically the perfect starting pitcher.
He’s not just doing this in short outings, either. After Skubal had gone through the rotation a few times following his return from injury, he had a seven-start stretch with three outings of seven innings and three of six innings.
If Skubal can stay healthy for a full season, he’ll almost certainly be a Cy Young candidate. That’s the No. 1 reason to have hope for the Tigers as early as 2024.
Other young pitchers
No matter how much he says he loves being here, I’m operating under the assumption that the Tigers won’t have Eduardo Rodriguez next year. He’ll certainly opt out of the final three years of his agreement, and then it’ll be a bidding war on the open market.
How many times have you seen a player opt out and then actually resign with the same team? It doesn’t happen very often.
The good news: Even without Rodriguez, the Tigers have plenty of choices to fill out the rotation behind Skubal.
Let’s start with Reese Olson, who quietly came up and gave the Tigers 103 solid innings in his MLB debut. The 24-year-old averaged a strikeout per inning while maintaining a 1.12 WHIP and 3.99 ERA. He’s probably not going to be an ace, but early returns suggest he’s at least a back-end rotation guy with the upside for more.
The same can be said for Sawyer Gipson-Long, though he’s far less proven. In four starts (full disclosure: all against bad teams), Gipson-Long gave the Tigers five innings of two or fewer runs in each. He struck out 26 batters in 20 innings and allowed just 22 base runners.
Unlike with Olson, who seems to have been pretty fortunate considering the quality of contact he allowed, the underlying numbers loved Gipson-Long. He posted a 2.48 xERA and .173 xBA. His extension is elite, and that allows his 94 mph fastball to play up.
The true test will be whether Gipson-Long has enough in his arsenal to succeed for a full season against MLB hitters. His ability to miss bats and limit hard contact at a near-elite rate were both intriguing, but the walk rate, combined with a general lack of minor-league success, are definite red flags.
I’m not overly worried about Gipson-Long’s extreme fly ball tendencies -- at least not yet. The contact against him was so consistently weak that those fly balls are much more likely to turn into outs.
The other rotation options include Matt Manning, Casey Mize, Spencer Turnbull, and Alex Faedo. All four will be returning from seasons cut short (or entirely wiped out) by injury.
If the Tigers bring back Rodriguez or sign someone of a similar caliber, the rest of the starting rotation should fill out nicely.
Spencer Torkelson’s power
It’s been so long since the Tigers had a legitimate home run threat in the heart of the lineup. Look at the players who have led the team in homers the past five seasons:
- 2019: Brandon Dixon (15)
- 2020 (COVID-shortened season): Miguel Cabrera (10)
- 2021: Robbie Grossman (23)
- 2022: Javier Baez (17)
- 2023: Spencer Torkelson (31)
Dixon and Grossman should never lead an MLB team in homers, and neither should the disastrous version of Baez the Tigers have received.
But Torkelson was a No. 1 overall draft pick in large part because of his raw power, and during the second half of 2023, that power potential turned into actual production.
Following an 0-for-4 performance on June 26 in Texas, Torkelson’s batting average dropped to .218, with a .298 OBP and .360 slugging percentage. He had just eight home runs in 76 games.
The next day he hit home run No. 9. The day after that, numbers 10 and 11.
Over the final 83 games of the season, Torkelson hit 23 home runs and posted a .246/.327/.524 slash line. His on-base percentage will almost certainly improve -- it was a strength at every one of his stops en route to MLB.
He’s doing what he did on every rung of the minor-league ladder: Adjust to a higher level of pitching and make consistent hard contact. Torkelson ranked in the 94th percentile in terms of hard hit percentage this season and the 87th percentile in average exit velocity.
You might ask, “What’s the difference? And why do they matter?”
Average exit velocity is pretty self-explanatory: It’s the average mph of every batted ball put in play. Torkelson’s 91.8 mph average is comparable to that of elite sluggers like Adolis Garcia, Kyle Schwarber, and Austin Riley.
But it’s possible to have a high average exit velocity and a middling hard-hit rate. In those cases, players are likely hitting a bunch of home runs and a bunch of popups, so the average remains high, but the consistency lacks. A whopping 50.9% of Torkelson’s balls in play were hit 95 mph or harder -- that’s elite.
On top of the power, Torkelson walked at a 9.8% clip, which is well above league average. His expected batting average was .251 -- a full 18 points higher than his actual batting average. Expect his numbers to regress much closer to that .250 range as early as next season.
Torkelson doesn’t chase out of the zone very often, so it wouldn’t be a surprise to see his strikeout rate drop and help that OBP even more.
Based on his second-half production and the underlying numbers, a 40-homer, .350 OBP-type season isn’t out of the realm of possibility for Torkelson, especially since he just turned 24 years old and is far from a finished product.
FUN FACT: If Torkelson had played every game this season at Guaranteed Rate Field (White Sox), Minute Maid Park (Houston), T-Mobile Park (Seattle), Citizens Bank Park (Philadelphia), Great American Ball Park (Cincinnati), or American Family Field (Milwaukee), he would have hit 40+ homers.
Kerry Carpenter’s emergence
The Tigers desperately needed some hidden gems to emerge offensively within the system, and it sure looks like Carpenter is an answer to those prayers.
The former 19th-round pick had a successful first taste of MLB action last season, posting a .795 OPS across 113 plate appearances. But this season, he proved that wasn’t just a product of small sample size -- and perhaps even more importantly, he made a case for himself as an everyday player.
Carpenter wasn’t quite a lock to be in the lineup every day in April, and then he missed the entire month of May on the injured list. But as soon as he returned on June 9, A.J. Hinch started putting him on the lineup card nearly every night.
In 98 games after returning from the IL, Carpenter batted .289 with a .352 OBP and a .473 slugging percentage. He finished the year with 20 home runs, 17 doubles, and an .811 OPS.
The metrics support Carpenter as a solidly above-average MLB hitter. His plate discipline could use some work, but he’s only 572 plate appearances into his career, so a 25.1% strikeout rate and 7% walk rate aren’t deal breakers, by any means.
Carpenter has plus speed and a strong arm, but his defense in the outfield needs to improve. There’s a good chance he’ll see more time at designated hitter in the post-Cabrera era.
But in a healthy season, you don’t have to squint too hard to see a 30-homer outcome for Carpenter -- he just finished on a 27-homer-per-162-game pace, after all.
The best news might be that Carpenter kept his head above water against left-handed pitching. Granted, a .657 OPS against lefties isn’t great, but his .333 OBP and 22% strikeout rate in those at-bats show that he wasn’t overmatched. If the Tigers don’t have a great right-handed platoon alternative, Carpenter isn’t necessarily going to hurt them.
Riley Green is elite when healthy
It’s frustrating that Greene’s first two MLB seasons have been cut short by injury, but on the bright side, he showed this season that when he’s on the field, he’s a legitimate five-tool player.
Greene finished 2023 with 11 home runs, 19 doubles, four triples, and seven stolen bases (in seven attempts) across 99 games. He posted an OPS of .796 and an OBP of .349.
As a 22-year-old.
Greene turned 23 last week, and when he arrives at spring training, he’ll do so as one of the best all-around players on the team.
Like Torkelson, Greene hit the ball hard with consistency. His barrel percentage jumped to 11.3%, which means more of those hard-hit balls were line drives and fly balls, and therefore far more valuable.
The one blemish in Greene’s profile this season was his tendency to swing and miss. He struck out in 27.4% of his at bats and came up empty on 28.2% of his total swings -- both far worse than MLB average.
It’s encouraging, though, that Greene managed to bat .288 (with a .287 xBA) despite those struggles. That suggests an even higher ceiling if the strikeout rate improves, which you would expect for such a young player.
Greene is a borderline elite base runner, even though that didn’t necessarily manifest in the form of stolen bases this season. His range and arm strength are both above average in center field, and likely will play even better in a corner.
The injuries have been discouraging, but I wouldn’t rush to label Greene “injury-prone” just yet. All three of his IL stints have spawned from freak plays: a foul ball off his foot, crashing into the wall in center field, and diving on his elbow.
Now, could his style of play increase Greene’s injury risk? Maybe, and that’s something the Tigers will assess and address this offseason, I’m sure. But they literally lowered the walls at Comerica Park because they wanted players like Greene to rob more home runs, so I don’t expect them to reel him in too much.
Parker Meadows looks like a major leaguer
Merely saying Parker Meadows looks like “a major leaguer” might sound like a backhanded compliment, but it’s not intended that way at all. We just have to acknowledge that there’s only one 37-game sample to analyze.
But it was a pretty strong 37 games.
The prospect hype surrounding Meadows has always been more about tools than actual production. His .729 OPS across 491 minor-league games is far from inspiring, and even at his best, he struck out at a very high clip in the upper levels.
For some players, the minor-league stats don’t tell the full story, though, and that might be the case for Meadows.
In his first taste of the big leagues, Meadows held his own at the plate. He posted a .338 OBP that’s backed up by a .248 xBA and elite 11.7% walk rate.
When Hinch moved Meadows to the leadoff spot down the stretch, the 23-year-old responded by striking out in just two of 24 plate appearances while posting an .833 OPS.
Again, the sample size is extremely small. But the most important takeaway is that Meadows wasn’t overmatched. He performed like someone who belongs.
The Tigers will happily live with a 25.5% strikeout rate if Meadows continues to walk at such an elite clip. His 10.8% walk rate in the upper minors suggests that’s certainly sustainable.
At the very least, the Tigers know they have an elite center fielder and base runner. Meadows graded out well above average in terms of range, arm strength, and sprint speed. He stole eight bases in nine attempts and legged out two triples in just 37 games.
Will Meadows be a guy who plays 150 games for the Tigers next season? Probably not, but his numbers across the board were actually better against left-handed pitching in limited at-bats, so it’s not out of the question.
Mud Hens duo
Detroit hasn’t had many offensive prospects to get excited about in recent years, but now there are two right on the cusp of promotion.
Colt Keith is the highest profile player in the organization -- a top-25 prospect who’s done nothing but rake since being drafted in 2020.
This season, as a 21-year-old, Keith started with Double-A Erie and dominated, batting .325 with a .977 OPS and 14 home runs across 59 games.
He was promoted to Triple-A Toledo and continued to thrive, slashing .287/.369/.521 in 67 games.
Keith finished the full season with 38 doubles, 27 home runs, and a .306/.380/552 slash line. It’s easy to see why Tigers fans are so anxious to see him in the Old English D.
But I think Scott Harris made the right call keeping him in Toledo through the end of the 2023 season. Keith just turned 22 in August, and the Tigers had no reason to rush him.
There are only two questions about Keith for next season: When will he debut, and at which position? The Tigers might feel comfortable starting the season with some combination of Matt Vierling and Andy Ibanez on the infield if they want to squeeze another season of control out of Keith.
As to his position, the Tigers gave us a pretty clear hint. His first 40 games at Double-A came at either third base or designated hitter, but then, his final 19 games featured six at third and six at second.
Following his promotion to Toledo, Keith played 35 games at second base and 21 at third base.
Clearly, the Tigers are hedging their bets. They know both positions need to be addressed, and Keith will likely be the answer to one of them. Jace Jung’s development at third base will also play a role in these plans.
There isn’t quite as much national hype surrounding Justyn-Henry Malloy -- likely because he’ll be 24 by Opening Day -- but fans are still eager to see him join the Tigers.
Detroit received Malloy in the trade that sent Joe Jimenez to the Atlanta Braves. He debuted in the Tigers organization this season and spent the whole year in Toledo.
Malloy had no problem handling Triple-A pitching, batting .277 with 23 homers, 25 doubles, and an eye-popping .417 OBP. He offset a slightly elevated strikeout rate with an absurd 18% walk rate.
There’s nothing left for Malloy to prove at the plate -- he’s as reliable a minor-league bat as the Tigers have in their organization. But where is he going to play?
Malloy began the season exclusively at third base before trying both corner outfield spots in June and July. Midway through August, he switched back to a full-time role at third.
Defense is not considered Malloy’s strength, and it’s probably the reason the Tigers didn’t promote him in 2023. They’ll have more flexibility without Cabrera holding down the DH spot, but Carpenter and Keith are both young bat-first guys who also have to factor into that equation.
Payroll flexibility
The celebration of Cabrera’s final week with the Tigers was beautiful, and it’s great that he’s going to stay with the organization in a front office role, but from an on-field standpoint, it’s great to get that yearly $32 million off the books.
Detroit will also regain the $18 million owed to Rodriguez in 2024 after he opts out of the remaining three years and $49 million on his deal.
That means the only post-arbitration money the Tigers are on the hook for next season is the $25 million owed to Baez (about $20 million too much). Add the estimated $50 million or so for arbitration-eligible and league-minimum players, and the Tigers are looking at a payroll of around $75 million heading into the offseason -- way below the league average.
This offseason will be a major test of Chris Ilitch as an owner. The Tigers don’t need to hand out massive contracts because there aren’t any free agents worthy of that commitment. But they need at least one starting pitcher and an infielder.
For example, will the Tigers be willing to up their price to retain Rodriguez? Or bring in an established starter like Jordan Montgomery? Could they go out and sign someone like Justin Turner or Donovan Solano to shore up the infield?
This is a reason to be excited because the Tigers have flexibility to fill holes in the roster and make it competitive next season. They just have to be willing to spend a little money.
Successful moves by Scott Harris
If he’s given the opportunity to make moves this offseason, there’s reason to be excited about Harris’ vision for the organization.
Harris and new general manger Jeff Greenberg will both be involved in personnel decisions going forward, and we have a pretty good idea what kind of player the Tigers are targeting.
Now, Harris wasn’t perfect in his first year. He should have traded Rodriguez at the deadline, and he definitely whiffed on releasing Jeimer Candelario and Willi Castro. But I’d say there were more positives than negatives.
His first major move was to trade Gregory Soto to the Phillies, and six years of Vierling seems like a worthy return. Vierling played all three outfield positions, second base, and third base for the Tigers while providing average offense.
Vierling is an excellent base runner and a strong defender, and he’ll probably always provide solid OBPs because he puts the ball in play and walks at an average rate. I wouldn’t expect him to hit much more than the 10 homers he finished with this season, but hey, that’s not nothing.
Harris also landed Max Clark and Kevin McGonigle in the first round of his first draft. Clark is considered the organization’s top prospect, and McGonigle hit .315 with 18 walks and 10 strikeouts in 21 minor-league games.
Harris showed his scouting prowess with a trio of shrewd offseason signings. Michael Lorenzen gave the Tigers an excellent first half and then got shipped to Philadelphia for a prospect. Meanwhile, Andy Ibanez quietly became nearly a 2 WAR player.
The Tigers identified 26-year-old lefty Tyler Holton as a waiver target this offseason, and he delivered a 3 WAR season with 85.1 innings of 2.11 ERA, 0.87 WHIP relief. Holton was one of the best relievers in baseball at suppressing hard contact and paired that with a low walk rate and high ground ball rate.
Bounce back from 2022
The way we’re feeling now is similar to the post-2021 vibe surrounding the Tigers. They enjoyed a resurgent second half that year and finished with 77 wins.
But the season that followed was a massive disappointment. Baez was a bust. Skubal and Mize both got injured. And the team lost 96 games.
It felt for a moment like the Tigers were back to square one, but that’s not how I feel anymore. They bounced right back to 78-84 this year and offered some genuine hope for the near future.
Now, there’s a chance that 2024 is just as disappointing as 2022, but I find that extremely unlikely. Almost every player on the roster provided a worst-case outcome that year, and the current roster has more young players who should continue to ascend.
Beating up AL Central
Remember how bad the Tigers were within their own division the past several years? Even in 2021, when they flirted with a .500 record into September, the Tigers went 7-12 against both the White Sox and Cleveland and 8-11 against both the Royals and Twins.
This season, for the first time since the World Series contending Tigers teams of the early 2010s, Detroit dominated the AL Central. They went 10-3 against the Royals, 9-4 against the Guardians, and 8-5 against both the Twins and White Sox.
That’s a 35-17 record within the division, which would typically be good enough to win it -- unfortunately, the Tigers went an unsightly 7-25 against the AL East.
It doesn’t look like the Central is going to be significantly better the next few years, and if the Tigers dominate the head-to-head matchups again, they’ll probably find themselves back on top for the first time in a decade.
Bounce back from slow start
Each of the first two years under Hinch, the Tigers got off to such miserable starts that they could never dig out of those holes. It looked like that was going to be the case again when the Tigers started 2-9, but they found a way to right the ship.
Six of the first nine teams the Tigers played ultimately ended up in the playoffs. That tough early schedule led to a 10-17 start, but they followed up with a 15-9 stretch that pulled them within one game of .500 and the first-place Twins.
Injuries and a nine-game losing streak in June ultimately sunk the Tigers, but they played well above .500 baseball the rest of the way (52-47).
If the Tigers want to contend deep into the summer, they have to get off to a much faster start in 2024. The schedule begins with the White Sox, Mets, Athletics, and Pirates, so it certainly seems possible.
Strong finish
On the second-to-last day of August, the Tigers hit a rough patch and lost their fifth game in a row to fall 15 games below .500. It looked like they were heading for another third- or fourth-place finish in the division.
But the next day, they beat the Yankees in extra innings. Then they went to Chicago and swept the White Sox.
From Aug. 30 to Oct. 1, Detroit won 19 of 29 games and swept three series. That push was just enough to take over second place and finish with the team’s best record since 2016.
Go back even further and you’ll see the Tigers went 19 series without getting swept to finish the season. That stretch included series against the Dodgers, Rays, Astros, Twins, and Marlins -- all playoff teams. Progress.
The Tigers that lost nine straight games in June didn’t look anything like the team that finished the year playing winning baseball. That could be indicative of better times ahead.
