2012 Season, Awards, Players

Kept the MVP in the D

87 Comments

Miguel Cabrera is your 2012 AL MVP.

What was billed to be a neck and neck battle between Old School and New School turned out to be Cabrera in a laugher, as he took 22 of 28 first place votes, and handily beat Trout with 362 points to 281 points.

I sat in on the Cabrera conf call (thank you billfer for forwarding me the info) – a few highlights:

1) Albom asked about “old stats” vs. “new stats” and what Cabrera’s thoughts on them were; specifically what Cabrera thought about Trout dominating the new stats. Albom seemed to want to bait Cabrera into proclaiming a preference for traditional metrics. Cabrera responded that he grew up following those stats, and that it was very special for him to lead in the 3 major categories, but that he understands the importance of the new stats and thinks that there is a place for both of them. Keep an eye out for Albom’s column in the morning.

2) A reporter from Reuters asked Cabrera if winning the Triple Crown won him the MVP and pointed out that 4 less hits, or 2 less HRs, and Cabrera doesn’t win the Triple Crown. Cabrera basically said no Triple Crown – no MVP.

3) A reporter asked in Spanish whether Cabrera was nervous leading up to today. Cabrera said no, he thought that he was deserving, but thought that Trout had a tremendous season and expected Trout to win. I thought this was a great, candid response. I’m guessing that the major papers have translators on the line, but it will be interesting to see if anyone runs with this in the morning.

4) Cabrera was humble, respectful of everyone, and extremely appreciative of his teammates and fans.

Congrats, Cabrera.

87 thoughts on “Kept the MVP in the D”

  1. Miguel Cabrera is not only the MVP but the Best player in baseball. He was voted so by his peers, “Player of the Year”
    11/5/12:”MLBPA names Miggy Player of the Year”
    Late and close, Trout:277/.338/.784. Miguel:.337/.422/1.040
    2 outs ,RISP:286/435/.782.. Miguel:420/.491/.1.211
    High leverage:312/.359/.917. Miguel:343/.408/.980
    Not even close. Miguel ,easily , the MVP

    1. Agreed, throw Bobby Valentine in the mix too, although he did get injured, the list is long… I mentioned Joe before, and I may have misspelled his name, apologies

  4. There is a great takedown on Mitch Albom’s column at Deadspin. The link contains a swar word so you may never see it, but it exists.

    2. Much ado about nothing. Albom is the 2000-year-old-man position. Magary is the mom-never-listens-to-me-because-I-am-a-kid position. Albom needs to fade away. Magary needs to grow up.

      1. Well, they haven’t played a game yet (remember the 1000-run Tigers?), but anything to challenge the BOS/NY lock on the East is fine by me.

        1. Quietly, stealthily, the Blue Jays’ plan is to sign every free agent in baseball while no one is looking. Hamilton, Swisher, Soriano, Sanchez, and Greinke are next.

          1. Toronto is up to some crazy money laundering scheme methinks. They could be trying to destroy the value of the franchise so they could sell it to a new owner that moves it to an American city while cleaning the books up of all the tainted cash they have in their possession. I demand an investigation!

  7. Laird deserts Tigers for two year deal with Atlanta. All those crying crocodile tears raise your hankies.

    1. That’s good, he’s had 10 years in the majors and essentially 9 disastrous offensive seasons. Even batting .282 last year he still only mustered .374 for power. Good on the defensive side but hardly worth the million bucks we paid him and the Braves probably gave him more. He’s overpaid and a negative ROI player. Every team in baseball should aspire to have 2 catchers that are better than Laird imo. He barely qualifies as MLB caliber, and only because of his defensive value does he get any chance to justify being a pro.

      1. I think you’re judging Laird a tad harshly. The pool of catching talent in MLB is thin. Teams are often lucky to have ONE catcher better than Laird. The Tigers would undoubtedly have him back but for the matter of playing time they can’t and won’t promise him. Which is not to say I want him back, mind you.

        1. I think you overestimate the defensive value respective to offense. Defense is easier to acquire than offense in baseball, which is a rare and special value. Even with Laird’s defense he still only mustered a one year deal with us for 1 million, that’s how valuable his defense was. Look at Napoli who is looking at probably more like 10 million a year, because he can hit, despite being a defensive liability. I’m definitely not being harsh on him, I never show a bias or downgrade a player without having thought it out very analytically from every angle.

          I am judging him the same way I judge any player, and he’s barely MLB worthy. Just barely makes it over the mendoza line on overall value. The Tigers would be better off gambling with a completely unproven prospect from our farm system before I would recommend going with Laird, that’s how weak of a value he is because of his poor offense.

  8. Did you guys see this article on MVP voting? Check out all the Detroit writers who voted Fielder ahead of Jackson. I think that Fielder had slightly better offensive numbers (from an OPS+ and oWAR perspective), but with AJax’s defense, you’d think he would have received a vote or two.

    http://www.mlive.com/tigers/index.ssf/2012/11/strangely_austin_jackson_not_a.html

    Also, I read that JP Morosi voted Price over JV for Cy Young. JV lost by 1 vote.

    1. I figured it should have been JV due to the big difference in innings pitched, but Morosi made the point that Price put up equivalent numbers and he managed to do so against the tougher competition of the AL East. I’d have to say I agree with his decision.

      1. My guess at this point is if Porcello and Peralta don’t come charging out of the gate, they will be lightning rods. If the Tigers actually replace Peralta, his replacement will be THE lightning rod (think back to Edgar Renteria). Torii Hunter has great lightning rod potential (think back to Gary Sheffield). Brennan Boesch (if he’s back) and Quintin Berry could be lightning rods just for taking up a spot on the bench.

        All of these players could be spared from any controversy whatsoever if only the Tigers would reacquire Brandon Inge. If I ever own a lightning rod, I will name it Brandon Inge.

  11. http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2012/11/diamondbacks-interested-in-jhonny-peralta.html

    this is one of those ‘rumors’ that doesn’t seem to be supported by logic…at least from AZ GM Kevin Towers’ perspective. Not really sure why AZ would consider trading Upton… unless they feel they can do better than: $9.75 million in 2013, $14.25 million in 2014 and $14.5 million in 2015…Upton’s remaining contract.

    Also unless DET knows they can upgrade at SS, why trade Peralta?

      1. I would rather have purchased Melky as an OF for $16MM for 2 years than to give up Peralta to get Upton. So I don’t think he should be the target from Arizona if we signed Drew to then trade them Peralta. It would make more sense to ask for the pair of Montero at C and Aaron Hill at 2B, and then give them Peralta + Infante and something else. That would give us 3 small upgrades with Drew over Peralta, Hill over Infante, and Montero over Best Prospect.

        None of those 3 are elite players, but it would be 3 men better than we are now. The only downside is that a swap like that doesn’t create any bonus efficiencies and would cost a handful of millions and would be nothing more than being a way to open up new players to purchase for cash, but it is better than purchasing anybody else at 2B or C that is currently available, so it could be a possible move.

        That’s why I don’t think Upton should be the target because Melky would have been a viable FA purchase whereas nobody at C or 2B is as attractive. So I will predict DD signs Drew and then trades for Hill + Montero if he does a deal with Arizona. If not that deal then I would rather look at the list of Arizona’s top prospects before checking out an Upton deal.

      2. I really hope the Tigers are setting their sights at SS higher than Drew. I’d as soon they kept Peralta at that rate.

        Asdrubal Cabrera, J.J Hardy. Hey, Jimmy Rollins. Drew? Meh.

        1. Yeah I wouldn’t want Drew on this team, but I think he’s the kind of guy that DD likes and is very much in play. I mean if he would play for a “prove it” contract for a couple million bucks or some amount way less than Peralta, then it becomes attractive, but not on a guaranteed basis. Even as a crapshoot wildcard we need to aim much higher, and he provides a ton more risk than breakout potential. I wouldn’t touch him for what his expected market price seems to be.

          Drew has been in the majors for 7 years and still 0 impressive seasons. It’s just not worth the aggravation.

          1. I’d rather see Worth or Santiago at SS than Drew. Drew would be… like replacing Peralta with Peralta (not enough FANTASTIC on defense or offense), for roughly twice the money.

            What’s Carlos Guillen doing these days?

            1. Well I would say not quite. If you had 5 dollars, would you rather keep it or gamble to get 7 or 3, or 10 or nothing? If odds are perfectly fair to get the win or the loss, then you are getting something that has the same expected value, but more likely not the precise value.

              Peralta is more of a safe bet for a mediocre result, whereas Drew is a gamble to win or above that result. So it’s not like trading an apple for an apple, it’s like trading an apple for an orange when you aren’t sure if you like oranges more than apples or vice versa.

              1. I’m probably underrating Drew’s defense. It’s an exaggeration to suggest that Drew = Peralta. I take it back. I agree that Peralta is a safe bet for a mediocre result, overall, though I’d guess at a better year at the plate in 2013.

                Peralta is like betting the $6 on a return of either $8 or $4. Drew seems like betting $10 on a return of either $14 or $6. There’s a difference, but – at least subjectively – it’s not enough to get excited about. Unless Drew is an absolutely brilliant defender. Injury no effect, not another risk factor?

                What made Drew so tradable for the Diamondbacks?

              2. He has injury concerns, a disappointment from high-end projections as a youth, and he has proven he’s not a bigtime hitter.

                He was traded by Arizona for a minor leaguer, so they chose to give up big salary when not in a position to compete aggressively so that they could build for the future. Trading salary for youth is always a smart move imo unless you are set up to compete for a title and can justify overpaying a player.

              3. On the other hand, why would I object to any defensive upgrade at SS, especially when Drew only needs to be signed and not traded for? Bring him on. Put me down for oranges.

              4. Well that works for you since an apple or an orange is a nearly equivalent nutrition value, the issue is that some fans might have an allergy to oranges. It’s not really a great analogy, the concept is say apples are totally safe for all of the fans and members of the team. But suppose oranges have a chance to excite you to eat fruit regularly when otherwise you wouldn’t do it for the apple, however what if too many people are allergic to oranges.

                So the debate becomes, is it worth it to gamble from the safe fruit for something that might give a more positive yield if there is some chance it could make you sick. Or should you play it safe and take the apple and not gamble with your health. One logical way of looking at it is to say there’s not reason for that kind of a silly gamble, but another way is to say that you are depressed altogether if you don’t get something much better than what you have since you aren’t in a qualified state, so you have to take the gamble to have any chance to win whatsoever. It’s a philosophical conundrum that has to do with risk aversion levels, see this link for more detail on a different way to categorize these 2 fruits:

                http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Risk_aversion

              5. It’s much simpler than that for me. What do I value most at SS? Defense. Advantage: Drew. Overwhelming alternative possibilities from Peralta that counter this? None. Overwhelming risks with Drew? None. Done.

                Is Drew the best choice overall? Maybe not, but he’s one of the most easily available. Signing someone is less of a risk than trading for them. And he doesn’t have to be $6-8 million better than Santiago or Worth. Only better. Better is better, and the bar isn’t terribly high in this case.

    2. Also, why the interest in Upton still? Unless they plan to offer Garcia or Castellanos or both in trade, which seems very unlikely to me. The only missing piece in the OF puzzle is the possible RHB platoon partner for Dirks. Unless Dirks himself is in trade plans. Or unless they plan to put Dirks on the bench and Upton in LF for the foreseeable future while waiting on the aforementioned prospects to duke it out for the eventual vacancy in RF.

        1. “The biggest problem with Drew Sharp’s articles is that Drew Sharp writes them.”

          I enjoyed that part of the article.

        2. Ok so what if we paid Hunter $20MM per year, you still like him? What if it was $30MM? At what point does overpaying him turn it from an exciting move to a frustrating move? I agree with Drew Sharp’s sentiment because I think it was a terrible move.

          1. Well, I don’t think Hunter was overpaid, and it’s only 2 years. It fits a plan for Garcia/Castellanos. It makes sense. The Tigers needed a Hunter more than they needed a Hamilton or a Swisher, and Hunter, it appears to me, was the only Hunter-type out there for this plan/price/length of contract.

            1. What about Melky? He signed for way less, a whopping 5 million per year discount. He’s much younger, would likely have more trade value in either year 1 or 2 than Hunter if we wanted an out, and how do you rationalize something that is “ONLY” 2 years? If it’s a great deal you want more, but if it’s an overpayment then you don’t justify an overpayment by saying it’s only a small overpayment for a short time. That’s like saying why not pay $4 per gallon of gas when it’s $3.92 across the street. It’s “ONLY 8 cents more for ONLY one tank of gas” right? Yeah maybe, but it still isn’t logical to not pick the other corner for the 8 cent discount. That’s a HUGE unrealistic gas discount, whereas Melky’s discount was a MUCH bigger proportion and for a MUCH younger player with other ways to benefit.

  12. Melky Cabrera is bad gasoline. I always fill up at the Torii Hunter station across the street, totally worth the extra $1.50 a gallon. Many times I’ve been driving my Tigermobile down the stretchway and passed by stranded motorists hoofing it back to the nearest gas station, LF containers in hand, hoping to find some honest Gregor Blanco (unleaded, no ethanol) to pour in the tank and get their sputtering teams to start.

    1. Well if $4 is the market price for gas, then $1.50 is 3/8 more. Hunter cost the Tigers 5/8 more, so even under that comparison it’s still a bunk deal. 😉

      Some people just like to watch the world burn, and DD is one of them.

        1. I think it would be nearly impossible for him to play up to his contract value, so I estimate the odds that I will warm up enough to be less than 1%. He’d have to have an inhuman year and break some serious records. Even then it would be a hard sell because that would be such a fluke that you couldn’t possibly know if you were going to get that kind of a fluke before the contract signing, which still makes it a bad logical move at the time the move was made, which is the only time to judge it. Afterwards is too late.

          1. I expect Torii Hunter to make the Tigers a better and more interesting team. I will root for him to do so, and not because I’d like to be thought some kind of genius for having favored him over other OFs such as Hamilton. WHOEVER is on the Tigers is a player I want to do well because I like to see the team win.

            Other than hoping that your favorite team doesn’t spend too much on this at the expense of that, I don’t see how “playing up to contract value” is a fan’s concern, or even a manager’s concern. Or how “player value per $ of salary” can be defined objectively and applied universally. Or what the great appeal of doing so would be.

            Baseball is a team sport. Teams win and teams lose. You can buy the services of a player, but you can’t buy wins. Wins are priceless. So there’s no sense in getting worked up over how much they cost or whether they could be had more cheaply. What it costs to win on the field, where the games are in fact won or lost, is not measured in money.

            1. Yeah I don’t see it like that at all. There is not unlimited money and using it up unwisely comes at expense of other options that have better purposes. Every year DD invests countless millions unwisely and gets weak leverage and that continues to weaken us year in and year out, and he destroys our potential for higher odds in ever year that he’s been here. If you waste money, you create a handicap, and you can’t avoid that penalty. He continues to stockpile poor purchases and maneuvers and creates massive waste of money and opportunity.

              1. Yes, you’re right. The Tigers are much weaker now than they were in 2002 and 2003. Dombrowski has squandered all the promise that 20 years of futility was building up to. Such a waste of potential for higher odds and greater leverage, whatever that means. We can only hope that a luminary such as Jeffrey Loria will buy the Detroit Tigers soon and get rid of DD. Until then, we can only sit here and envy fans of the Pittsburgh Pirates and Kansas City Royals.

              2. We were weak in 2002 and 2003 only because of many years of neglect prior to that period. We are weaker now in 2013 coming up by arguably HUNDREDS of millions of dollars from what we could have been if we would have not made all of the mistakes DD has made since he signed on. The past is the past and I’m only judging based upon DD’s choices since he has been here and what he has screwed up imo. You have to count the money he blew on poor choices and the revenues we missed from great choices he failed to make. That’s over $200MM in real money by my count. We could have Josh Hamilton today for free in exchange for not making all of the mistakes that DD has made during his time here if you want to look at it that way.

                So whether you like the team as is or not, we could have essentially had the same value of a team plus Josh Hamilton by simply not having had DD the entire time we had him. Not to say that my personal style advocates buying guys like JH, but it is an interesting way to look at the differential from what I consider to be a poor GM in contrast to a great GM.

  13. Sorry, “20 years” of futility was an overstatement. Seemed like 20.

    TSE, you make sense sometimes, but when you talk about Dave Dombrowski, you don’t. It’s that simple. Questioning this or that as unwise, I can see that. Not this blanket condemnation. It’s really too much, and it does nothing for your credibility.

    “we could have essentially had the same value of a team plus Josh Hamilton by simply not having had DD the entire time we had him.”

    Thus, without DD as the Tigers GM ever, we could now have a team as crappy as you currently see it but for the addition of Josh Hamilton. In other words, either your whole beef with DD boils down to him not signing Hamilton this offseason, or Hamilton as a Tiger would alone and in itself be enough to redeem 11 years of disastrous general management by DD – even though you wouldn’t advocate signing a guy like JH. OK. Please don’t explain. Could we please move on to a subject other than DD and the contrast between poor and great GMs?

    1. Well I think that’s unfair to say. I literally could write a 200 page book to describe my full feelings on everything that DD has done wrong and show you well over a $200MM difference. If you can’t see and understanding everything I’ve picked up on, then I don’t expect it to make sense to you. So I don’t accept your critique there of where I’m not making sense in that regard since you aren’t seeing the big picture or the full picture.

      I’m not sure what you mean with the 2nd paragraph, because that seems to support my alternative point of view I was suggesting, by saying if we were no different than we were now but to have Josh Hamilton for the rest of his life free and on top of were we are now, that seems like a big deal to me.

      And no I don’t think we should have signed Hamilton this offseason, I’m not into signing FAs for well over 20 million bucks a year. I think we should already have at least 3 OFs that are great bargains and great players by now so that we don’t have to overspend to get JH, but that we are a profitable team to such an uncanny level that we could choose to still sign him and trade one of those three OFs for something for the future and splurge on money just to become even moreso unbeatable, not that we would even need to do that if we did things right over the last 10 years, but we certainly could if Illitch didn’t care about profitability as much as trying to set an insane record for winning games in a regular season, but as a businessman I wouldn’t have that particular type of goal.

      And well you opened up this dialogue by wanting to go back to 2002 so I am giving more clarity to justify my positions and comments over that time frame which are still fully and logically substantiated, just for the record. It’s a lot of money and a monumental situation of epic dollar amounts and our team’s standing within professional baseball and sports in general, so as long as it is alluded to, it’s important to back those things up and remember what has happened and the extreme atrocities we lived through and the awesome times we have missed.

      It’s a huge and serious deal, and I’ll never forget those 10 years and what happened and what could have been. I didn’t blow those 200 million dollars, I was there and able to save that and then some and make wonderful things happen in contrast, and I’m thankful for who I am and what I have and what I’m capable of, and this is a time to be appreciative of the good things in life and to honor them as alternatives to the sick and sad things in life.

  14. “I was there and able to save that and then some and make wonderful things happen in contrast, and I’m thankful for who I am and what I have and what I’m capable of, and this is a time to be appreciative of the good things in life and to honor them as alternatives to the sick and sad things in life.”

    you were there? and able to save what?

    1. I lived through that time, was available, and would have taken a different path. To save the couple hundred million dollars that DD squandered away.

      2. have you ever sent your resume in to Mr. Illitch? or any of the other 31 owners in MLB? If you are as savvy as you claim, surely someone would hire you.

        just curious….what is your age/profession?

        1. A business associate/friend of mine was personal friends with a Tigers VP and I was able to get an introduction to him at the park and toured his office and he allowed me to use his name attached to a package I sent to DD in order to get my foot in the door for him to read it. I ended up receiving a form rejection letter signed by DD that basically said they weren’t hiring at this time, even though my proposal I sent him wasn’t asking for a job so to speak, it was asking to have a meeting to discuss ideas I have and to further expound upon my qualifications for why it would be worth his time to meet with me and learn more about the unique ideas I have. I took that to mean that he didn’t read what I sent him since the rejection letter was not on point with respect to the premise of my proposal. I once heard DD say he would leave no stone unturned to better the team and my gift-wrapped stone was just tossed aside without any investigation unfortunately.

          I have never sent anything to Mr Illitch. If I thought he might read what I had to say then I would be happy to write a 500 page book for him to learn my life story and everything I understand about the game that I think he is lacking, but that doesn’t seem to be a practical likelihood or a logical method to explain my baseball philosophy and strategies. If there was a simple way to explain that which is relevant in the form of a letter then I would have already put those words together but that’s not a sensible way to transact this type of information and logic. The shorter 20 page piece that I sent to DD didn’t even get looked at, let alone isn’t a logical way to convey what I have of value to convey.

          I’m 34 and I do various things from business consulting, sales and sales training, and insurance products for financial/estate planning purposes.

          1. interesting. I am in a similar field of business.

            I might ask, do you take the same abrasive approach with your clients? Meaning, do you loudly and boldly proclaim that your knowledge is vastly superior to anything else they might encounter?

            1. I don’t follow your drift as to that sentiment regarding my online communications since I don’t see that as how I posture myself. And I do have unique solutions for businesses and for people doing retirement planning or estate planning that are much different than what 95% of people do, so I do absolutely inform them that I take a unique approach to asking the right questions and considering everything and then having access to the very best financial products that create for an optimally efficient solution that I challenge my clients to find a better plan than the one I create, because there are lots of things I have to my advantage that make it impossible for 95% of my competitors to be able to come up with a better plan that what I can.

              When there’s a lot of money at stake all they have to do is humor me and then I can prove it and close the deal and it works with fantastic success because my clients have nothing to lose in hearing a new idea from me that NOBODY else will have that is exactly the same and then they can pick which they think is the best.

              I am a master at creating rapport in professional relationships with businesses and the end clients, everybody loves my approach as I’m highly professional and extremely pleasant in my approach and in how I conduct business on sensitive matters where sometimes there are serious issues than just money at stake, such as concerns about death or terminal illnesses that are involved.

  15. I literally could write a 200 page book to describe my full feelings on everything that DD has done wrong

    You’ve already written more than 200 pages of tripe about DD here. What you haven’t ever done is made any specific recommendations. For all of your bluster, you’ve never made a single recommendation that could be used to judge whether your analysis has any foresight value.

    1. Jeff, way to be! You took the words right out of my brain… I have been wondering for awhile if there is a way to stand up to this verbosity…

      1. Stand up to what now? If you have something on your mind, the best way is to communicate and have a conversation with that which you don’t understand or need clarification on, not to play games and join in on negative commentary that has nothing to do with baseball and only to do with spreading discouragement from intelligent conversation.

        1. With all due respect, how do you know that your part of the conversation is always intelligent? 😉

          1. It’s a matter of opinion and I believe I make a good faith effort to talk about baseball ideas and I don’t make posts that only have the purpose of trying to bring somebody down. And I feel that I put a lot of quality thought behind all of my opinions. One person on this page is playing doctor and diagnosing me with a mental problem, another is claiming I haven’t made one suggestion when I clearly have made tons of suggestions, and another guy is piling on and cheering him on for making a personally negative based comment that is clearly untrue. Those 3 comments have nothing to do with baseball in any way, shape, or form.

            1. It is not meant in a bad way. Just take yourself a tad bit less serious. If you say about DD you “would be happy to write a 500 page book for him to learn my life story and everything I understand about the game that I think he is lacking” – are you expecting anyone to take that serious? Why would DD want to learn your life story? He does not know you personally, right? How do you get to the conclusion that you have insight about the game that he is lacking? Dombrowski’s MAIN JOB is to manage the Tigers. You are blogging in your free time. So how on earth would he lack your insight?
              See, all these statements you make – I can take that as humorous. But then you write all these superlong posts that all but scream YOU take it dead serious. You really ARE convinced that you are a better manager than Dombrowski, right? Can you see how people start not taking you serious? Can you imagine where that might be coming from?

              I do commend you for your astonishingly detailed knowledge of baseball, trade values of players etc. You really devote a lot of time to the analysis of the Tigers’ moves. That’s super great and I think we could really profit from your efforts. Just: 1. be more specific in your claims; 2. don’t claim you know more than the professional Tigers management and 3. don’t bury your significant statements in overwhelmingly long posts (unlike me right now ;-), but this had kind of accumulated in my mind). We all love the Tigers, let’s enjoy!

              1. First question, DD should take it serious because he’s spending gargantuan amounts of money to not achieve fantastic results, and listening to my input would help him achieve fantastic results. My advice is worth millions, and he is unable to achieve those millions without my knowledge and expertise, so he should have a vested interest in hearing me out and qualifying what I say. And naturally he probably hears from lots of people that claim to have better ideas, but I sent him an intro to explain why he should take a small amount of time to qualify if my info is credible. He is currently squandering millions of dollars and if he doesn’t have the solutions, which he has proven he doesn’t, then it’s up to him to figure out the most efficient way to get the solutions, and I’m one possible choice. If he can’t get my solutions to reap those million dollar benefits then it’s still his responsibility to find another way and keep working until he does, and so far he has failed miserably. When he investigates me, then he can reap those benefits, and if he never does, then hopefully for the Tigers he figures out another way to accomplish that. So far he hasn’t. My opinion is that I’m the quickest way to get the biggest bang-for-the buck benefits. And still where we stand today, DD is left without the right answers. That’s horrible when it’s clear to me what needs to be done and I’m sure I know what I’m talking about because I have spent a great deal of time figuring it out and I have extreme unique abilities/knowledge that qualify my position in that regard.

                Second point, yes I can see why random people on the internet wouldn’t take me serious, but they haven’t reviewed the proposal I sent to DD to understand why they should take me serious or have even possess a full understanding of my knowledge and life experiences to understand where I’m coming from (not to mention DD didn’t even read my intro package as evidenced by the nature of the response letter he mailed back to me). If you or other bloggers on this site had decision making power to hire me as the GM, then I would extend the same offer to that decision maker to simply meet with me so that I could explain it clearly, and I contend to deliver on proving that what I say makes sense when I’m allotted a fair chance to explain it and it will indeed be convincing once that logic is heard out and examined that in fact I could have brought about at least a 200 million dollar positive differential if I was here since DD was here. And it’s possible I could have brought about even a much higher result than even that, but as long as we are talking even 10 million dollars differential, I think whether it’s 100 or 200 or 300+ is a moot point other that it being a disastrously sick alternative path that we as a team chose to pick instead.

                And I’m always as specific as needed for whatever makes sense for any idea. Any poster is permitted to ask me any amount of clarifying questions to make sure they clearly understand anything they don’t currently understand in principle and so I’m doing my part to communicate my vision without writing 500 pages of extra information that is not relevant at this time for the casual viewer. But my suggesting some great ideas here isn’t going to somehow make them reality. My suggestions for what the Tigers should do revolves around doing vast changes to the team, so I’m suggesting an overhaul to philosophy of how we do things and I’ve described that very clearly on a general basis of what that would look like. We would dump 20-30 guys and rebuild a different core for the future and we need to do that IMMEDIATELY because we are way behind and really screwed up for the long-term in terms of finding a bonus efficiency worth hundreds of extra millions of dollars of value for future years now on top of the hundreds of millions we have lost over the last decade.

                That’s why for ONE single move for these Tigers that don’t take my advice, I’ve very clearly labeled that the next single best move we could do from this point is to upgrade SS or 2B via trade since no desirable FAs exist to help us do that.

                Not to mention, as the GM, not only would I advocate a complete roster design, but I would help the team benefit even on non-roster moves, such as helping them find strategic benefits to decisions regarding bunting choices, SB choices, PH choices, base-running, hitting logic, etc. as I see lots of other unnecessary mistakes that we voluntarily make that we don’t have to make. But all of that is a tremendous amount of work that isn’t nearly as valuable as the amount of time it takes to make strategic roster moves, so while that stuff could also be improved on and be fantastic in aggregate once all areas are managed properly, the roster changes represent the biggest initial impact of things that I could help improve through my input. We fail as a franchise on so much more than just picking players to have on the roster, and there’s TONS of things that I haven’t even listed here. Heck I can improve the profitability of the team by showing them how to manage the concession stands better if they truly want me to, but if I was GM I’m not sure how valuable that extra time would be worth in comparison to spending that time on the bigger issues.

                But the point is our team and franchise is missing out and failing at dozens of elements of the game of baseball in so many facets. There wouldn’t be a massive cash value to overhauling stadium operations although it’s still an issue because I feel the fans deserve better there in terms of a matter or principle, just for the record. But that’s a deeper issue after the most immediate issue of focusing on hundreds of millions of dollars being pissed away down the drains every decade.

        2. My description of your posting habits is grounded in fact. If the truth happens to have a negative tone to it, perhaps you should stop being so incessantly negative. Go ahead, I dare you to click that link and find an example of you being genuinely positive. I’ll be impressed if you find even one such example and I’ll be downright shocked if your negative/positive ratio was anything less than 50:1.

          Intelligent conversation is a wonderful thing and I would be absolutely thrilled to see you participate in it some day. Alas, I don’t expect to see the day because you believe that a Utopian baseball organization is possible and that you alone can create it. With such a mindset, your ramblings are meaningless to those of us who prefer to temper our dreams with a dose of reality.

  16. TSE: At the risk of being accused of piling on, I will speculate that what Mr. Molby is expressing is that the content of most of your postings are not of interest to the rest of us who participate in this just as fans of the team. If you feel or felt like you could be the GM of a MLB team, well go for it. Some 40 years ago I was an employee of a MILB frnachise, the 70-71 Spokane Indians by name, and I knew some great baseball minds, Peter O’Malley, Elten Schiller, and Tom Lasorda,to name three. I have played the game, coached at every level up to and including high school, and know a good player on a good team when I see one. I don’t give a rip about the salaries, or the contracts, just what happens between the chalk. I saw the Tigers play in Seattle in April, decided there was some magic there, and found this blog, too. I was thrilled with a great run and enjoyed all the posts, right up to the Series. Please consider the fact that you may not be the smartest “guy” around, and don’t take things so personally.

    1. Well I don’t think Illitch will be the owner much longer and he hasn’t created for a process that knows how to do the right thing and he puts the power in the hands of incompetent people like DD who is totally unqualified for that job. As soon as Illitch passes on then I’m going to quickly take an aggressive approach to trying to find a way to communicate with the new decision maker and taking a fresh approach to somebody who will hopefully be more open minded about other options and ideas. Unless of course I can find a way to gain Illitch’s ear and help out sooner, but I don’t currently have a way to do that.

      And no I don’t take things personally, that’s not my style, in my experience people who take things too personally aren’t as successful as those who don’t, so I do not and have never been like that. I’m very much against taking things personally. And I’m sure there is another person that exists that is “smarter” than me, and plenty of them, but that’s a generic label and can be defined many ways, but as far as being the smartest GM for a baseball or football operation, I’ve never met anybody or heard of anybody that I think is my equal and I think I’m the best in the world in that department. Somebody has to be the best in the world and all the evidence points to me as I haven’t even heard any glint of any information to suggest anybody can beat me in that realm. I’m on top until I find or hear of somebody that is better.

      1. “but as far as being the smartest GM for a baseball or football operation, I’ve never met anybody or heard of anybody that I think is my equal and I think I’m the best in the world in that department. Somebody has to be the best in the world and all the evidence points to me as I haven’t even heard any glint of any information to suggest anybody can beat me in that realm. I’m on top until I find or hear of somebody that is better.”

        please show us this evidence. i am dying to see it.

        1. Like I said, that could be 500 pages if I wanted to come up with everything that I can come up with to support that, and I don’t have that written out as of yet, and I don’t see why anybody would really be interested in seeing the 500 page book, it’s more practical to present that case in person. I’m not interested in going through an online interview process unless I’m chatting with the owner.

            1. Well it’s in the form of a Word document, but I wouldn’t want to share it. It’s embarrassing since I failed with that document and wouldn’t want to open it up to the public for what I would expect to be an onslaught of trolling comments.

              If you own an MLB baseball team and you are seriously interested in my help, then I would ask you for a personal meeting since we are able to communicate directly at this point and then I would be happy to supply that document as well as other materials and a presentation that I would develop as additional items for that meeting.

              1. how did you fail? you said it was never read by DD–never even opened.

                you also said that it would have saved hundreds of millions of dollars and that your ideas are far superior to any other GM out there.

                I just thought that it would be an interesting read…you dont seem to be the type that would let one form letter-rejection stand in your way.

                and no, I do not own a team. I have been a Tiger fan since 6th-7th grade, as the double-A team that came to Birmingham, AL (my hometown) was affiliated with the Tigers. I come to DTW to get news on the team that is not available locally (all Braves, all the time) and because I enjoy the discussion.

                If I purchase a team, I will certainly contact you.

              2. Well I’m only assuming that he didn’t read it. He could have read the first couple pages and thought it was a lousy pitch. And it would be more embarrassing if it was open to public criticism by those that just want to play games which is something I would expect would happen whether it was a great document or not.

                But in my own personal opinion the document is weak anyhow, I didn’t intend for it to be 20 pages of a holy grail, it’s soft and only intended to get DD to pick up the phone and say ok I’ll give you a few minutes since you did get at least vouched for by another VP who seemingly was impressed for a reason and what have I really got to lose. So I failed in being able to use that piece to initiate a follow up call, it just didn’t work to get the job done. I have to assume he at least read the first few sentences, I mean maybe he didn’t even bother to do that, but I have to give him some benefit of the doubt that he at least glanced at it and felt it wasn’t interesting enough to call me, and that’s all that matters.

                The existence of that document has no purpose other than to get a meeting with a baseball decision maker, whether an owner or GM, and it’s not for entertainment purposes, plus as said before it’s not a great construction for the intended purpose to begin with. If I had that moment back or with a new GM then I would revise it rather than use the same thing that didn’t work the first time for a follow up call for whatever reason of which I will never know.

                And thank you for taking the time to consider what I have to say in the event that you buy a team in the future, I won’t let you down and I promise I will deliver the goods that interest you greatly in helping you accomplish tremendous things with that team. Thank you for the opportunity to demonstrate that case and congratulations for being shrewd enough to take a chance on investigating what most people would say is an obscure option that is not worth the time, because this one is going to pay you off big-time!

  17. In my experience anyone who uses Expert in his tag probably isn’t one, just like Wile E. Coyote isn’t a Super Genius. Intelligence and foresight speak for themselves.and don’t need advertising.

    Nevertheless, reading this stuff is great entertainment!

    1. I agree with all of that to some extent. I have a lot of experience of hearing people make incredible claims that proved to be false and it’s very frustrating to find out that somebody is a fraud for over-promising. My personal motto is to not do that and always deliver more than what I promise to any audience whether I’m talking money in a business deal or just in casual about social issues.

      However to disagree with you somewhat, most people that call themselves experts in some subject usually are in fact experts at some level, although it’s not like I chose a screen name of something like “#1 greatest GM ever” so my personal screen name isn’t anything that proclaims very much at all in comparison to my post content, so not sure why you would comment about a screen name as being a controversial issue when my post content clearly takes things well beyond just being an “expert” at “strategy”, there’s a million experts at strategy of sorts, but I’m a special one upon further elaboration, so it makes more sense to post a skeptical response regarding my content more than my screen name imo.

      But for general purposes, most people that claim to be experts at some subject are typically in fact that, but to be an impressive expert or an elite expert above almost all of everybody else is a whole different thing. You can’t assume that somebody who says they are an expert in one subject automatically thinks they are better than all other experts. In this case I do in fact elaborate further to claim that I’m better than virtually all other experts, and in specific I don’t see one GM in professional baseball or football that is remotely close to my talent or knowledge level. I’m highly confidently that I’m superior to ALL of those people in those 62 current posts, and it’s not even close, just for the record. I have an explainable advantage though in that I’m a master of logic, which makes it unfair since I don’t see any of those 62 people as having the same intelligence aptitude amongst a variety of skills beyond that particular crucial one.

      To your next point, I personally am not advertising anything per se so that statement doesn’t properly apply to me, it’s just a self-chosen moniker that I feel represents myself and my areas of expertise which is logic and strategy. Those are my 2 strongest suits so to speak.

      Next, your comment about intelligence speaking for itself doesn’t really fit, because there aren’t enough topics here or conversation points that would set up for an opportunity for the internet audience to naturally discover that I could be such an elite level baseball GM. There’s so many logical issues with that thought construct that it doesn’t work like that. What if I was the world’s greatest rocket scientist and I posted some fancy posts about that, how would you qualify me as the best in the world if you don’t even know anything about that subject? It would take the other world’s best rocket scientists to chime in to help qualify that, but the general public wouldn’t have any basis for being able to make that determination. So that point is moot.

      And it makes sense to me that my post content is very entertaining, because if you choose to believe I’m credible then you can envision a profit of hundreds of millions of dollars and a continuously dominant baseball team, or if you choose to believe I’m delusional as others believe, then it’s a good opportunity to make fun of me and laugh at it.

  18. you just wrote an exhaustive post attempting to describe what you believe to be your strengths.

    It begs the question: what do you see as your weaknesses?

    1. Depends on the context of the question, for being a baseball GM it’s the lack of pre-existing experience in the field and a lack of connections to be able to put my strengths to use. And once in the position then it would be ramp up time to get on the same page with current Tigers staff and other league GMs that have been scouting players for a long time, I would have catching up to do on that type of homework, but that’s not really anything that concerns me since I don’t see that as a relevant obstacle to being successful at what I would set out to do. I would still very quickly and very easily vastly improve the team’s position in a short period of time and those weaknesses would only determine how long it would take to being able to provide my own personal peak impact of contribution.

      1. actually, I was asking about personal weaknessess, not merely as it would relate to the GM job.

        1. Well I would say my biggest weakness is still in not having a network of professional relationships to help further a long-term career in sports management or politics which would be the 2 categories of work that I would be most passionate about. My limited powerful connections are my biggest weakness. I’m not diversified with contacts beyond primarily financial advisors and insurance salesmen. I could come up with more weaknesses too but it still is a vague question without understanding the specifics of who is asking and for what conversational purpose.

          I would also say in general that one of my weaknesses is I’m not super aggressive with my drive in trying to obtain financial wealth for myself, as personal monetary goals aren’t hugely important to me since I have conservative needs and wants. Perhaps if I was driven to make millions of dollars a year I would have had the impetus needed to barge down Illitch’s door and demand a meeting by now. But I don’t need the money or care that much about it. I think I could be a lot more successful in life if I was more profit-driven on a personal level, and that holds me back from achieving my dreams and helping a lot more people in volume like I should be doing.

          I put my heart and soul into helping people out in what I do now and it’s the next best thing I could be doing, but I don’t feel I’m impacting a large enough volume of people and it’s not what I truly would like to be doing if I could do anything.

    1. Your welcome, honesty is built into my code in everything I do.

      And that in fact could be another weakness is that sometimes I’m too blunt. I have arguably lost 2 jobs in the past due to honesty. The first was a great job I had for 8 years and I was asked to take 3 massive paycuts and I agreed to the first 2 and when my employer asked me how I felt about the 3rd one, my response was how about you just fire me right now because honestly I can’t stomach working for you any longer and making more money for you. He said ok no problem, you can even have the weekend to think it over and if you come in by Noon on Monday then you can keep your job under the agreement, or if you don’t show up by then I’ll terminate you at that moment. I told him I don’t need the weekend to think about it and there’s no chance I’m coming in and he said ok I understand and I’m sorry, and then I said well thanks for everything and good luck and I left.

      Now that was a terrible business decision for me since I still had a ton of residual value that I walked away from and let them off the hook, but I took that hit as a matter of principle because I thought it was the right thing to do. So I would say that’s a weakness is that I’m too honest at times and I tell people exactly what I think. Although it only seems to impact me when I’m dealing with somebody that is either dishonest or unprofessional in which case I’m not worried about the ramifications at that point.

      But as a baseball GM that wouldn’t apply the same way, because a situation like that is where I’m representing myself as an independent sales worker, and if I’m the GM and a reporter gets snotty with me, then as much as I might personally be tempted to tell him to take a hike I don’t have that luxury because I’m committed to my role which is representing a group that is not my individual self and so that’s why the context is important because a weakness in my personal life for individual concerns is not necessarily a weakness in a different setting when my individuality is not what I’m representing through my work or actions. If I represented the Tigers, then my job is to help them win the most games possible and/or make the most amount of profit for the team, and that’s what I am going to do to the max because I know how to perform the role that is my duty.

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