February 2005

It has been widely reported, Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez reported to spring training 22 pounds lighter than last season. In the steroid suspicion era, any significant weight loss will raise eyebrows. Combine the weight loss with an impending new drug policy, and allegations of steroid use by ex-teammate Jose Canseco and it’s pretty [...]

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Down at the bottom of my last post, I threw out a factoid that Alan Trammell only pitched out 8 times last season because the threat of Pudge was enough to deter the running game. This is despite the fact that Rodriguez only threw out 29% of runners attempting to steal. Pudge’s [...]

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Does Alan Trammell utilize small ball too much? What about his bullpen use and subsitution patterns. His in-game decision making over his first two years has been a source of frequent criticism on this site as well as others. However, what are the right tactics and how does he stack up [...]

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A few weeks back, I started looking at the Tigers’ defense through the work of David Pinto’s Probalistic Model of Range. Now that there seems to be a break in Tiger trades and signings, it is time to pick up where we left off. Baseball Musings has now published results for all [...]

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Okay, so the two have nothing in common. The Vegas comes in because I’ve spent the last two days there. The Farnsworth comes into play because I’ll finally have a chance to comment some more.
While I didn’t have much of a chance to hit the casions due to work, I did venture [...]

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The Tigers bolstered their bullpen today by acquiring Kyle Farnsworth from the Cubs for Scott Moore, Bo Flowers, and Roberto Novoa. At first glance I like this move. Novoa showed some potential, but he probably won’t turn out to be more than Farnsworth is now. Moore is another former first [...]

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This is definitely my most uncomfortable post of the year. The one where I ask you guys to consider making a donation. The only thing that makes it easier is that the donation isn’t for me, it is for the Big Brothers Big Sisters of America. I’ll be participating again this [...]

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The Tigers officially welcomed Magglio Ordonez today at Comerica Park. The terms reported in the AP were not discussed, so we’ll assume them to be accurate. One point was clarified and that was the “out clause” is only for the first year.
Some items of note from the presser:-Boras indicated that [...]

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The Tigers have signed Magglio Ordonez to a 5 year, $75 million dollar contract.
According to CNNSI, here is how the contract breaks down
The 31-year-old Ordonez gets a $6 million signing bonus and a $6 million salary in 2005, meaning the Tigers’ exposure is $12 million.
His contract calls for a $15 million salary in 2006, [...]

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Without any news happening, and without me having the time to do any analysis I decided to explore the question, “So if the Tigers do sign Magglio Ordonez, which current Tiger gets left out?”
In his column on Sunday Lynn Henning indicated that the Tigers would most likely release Bobby Higginson. I’ll have to [...]

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