All posts by billfer

Trades

Tigers acquire Gerald Laird

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It appears as if the Tigers have filled their hole behind the plate by acquiring catcher Gerald Laird from the Texas Rangers. In return the Tigers will ship out starting pitching prospect Guillermo Moscoso and Carlos Melo. The move is expected to be formally announced later today.

Gerald Laird

Laird will be 29 next year and has played in parts of 6 big league season. He’s only had one really productive year offensively when he hit 296/332/473 in 78 games. In his only season in which he broke the 100 game mark he struggled posting only a 224/278/349 line in 2007. Marcel and Bill James projections have him at a .310-.315 wOBA in 2009 and in 2008 MLB catchers posted a .311 wOBA line so he stands to be average for the position offensively.
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2009 Season, Free Agents, Injuries, Trade Rumors

Winter Meeting Eve Rumor Roundup

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Are Larish and Thames on the trading block?
Are Larish and Thames on the trading block?
UPDATED 12.08.08 5:08 a.m.

Tomorrow is the start of the Winter Meetings in Las Vegas and things are going to get crazy-stupid when it comes to rumors and people who saw people talking to people. It was at the winter meetings last year (a year ago last Thursday to be exact) when the Tigers traded for Miguel Cabrera and Dontrelle Willis. It was a move that came out of nowhere, so you never know what will happen. With that in mind, here is a cautious look at Tigers related rumors before the meetings begin.
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Defense, Statistics

Fangraphs now has UZR

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Fangraphs continues to become the stat site for sabermetric player stats. Today they announce the addition of MGL’s UZR fielding system which is widely regarded as one of the most sophisticated fielding systems available.

UZR has been largely unavailable for the last several seasons because MGL has been consulting for big league teams. He’s posted leaders and trailers the last few years, but now the full data set is available. The only difference is that this set uses Baseball Info Solutions data instead of STATS Inc.

You can find them on the player pages and leader boards on Fangraphs site. But I thought I would drop in a few of interest here. These are runs per 150 games.

Jack Wilson: 06: -2.8, 07: 12.7, 08: 2.2
Adam Everett: 06: 24.9, 07: 24.4, 08: 10.0
Cesar Izturis: 06: -10.8, 07: -2.5, 08: 12.5
Edgar Renteria: 06: 2.1, 07: -2.2, 08: 1.1

Free Agents

Tigers looking at Wood?

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Earlier today I lamented the type of players that the Tigers were being associated with. Mostly guys that were kind of blah. I also worried about the team’s financial situation given the Renteria and Wilson discussion. Perhaps my disappointment was premature, as there are reports that the Tigers are looking at Kerry Wood.

While happy at the thought of the Tigers pursuing someone who for his career has fanned 10.39 batters per nine innings, I’m also surprised in that earlier Dave Dombrowski said that Wood was out of the Tigers price range. But perhaps the recession is working in the Tigers favor in this case as Wood is only expecting a 2 year deal with a 3rd year vesting option.

Now the vesting part is important because Wood’s career has been severely hampered by injuries. If he’s healthy that the third year shouldn’t be a problem. But if injuries slow him any damage would be limited to 2010.

If the Tigers could add Kerry Wood, and maybe Brandon Lyon, now we’re talking a decent pen. If this is the reallocation of shortstop dollars, I’m on board. Of course these are just rumors of interest at this point, but it’s nice to be in on a good player.

DTW-TV

Detroit Tigers Weblog Live – The Pilot

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This is the DTW’s first foray into live web video. The show will kick off at 11 a.m. and you can watch it below. If you’d like to make comments you can head over to the ustream.tv page and join in the chat. I’ll be talking about the Tigers offseason, and the Jack Wilson rumors. Feel free to ask questions and I’ll try to tackle those as well.

I’ll try and archive this for later viewing after the show, and links I mention I will include in this post as well.

UPDATE: The archived version is now up below.

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DTW-TV, Site News

Announcing Detroit Tigers Weblog Live – The Pilot

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In an effort to enhance the site, I’ll be trying something new. I’m calling it Detroit Tigers Weblog Live, which is me streaming on ustream.tv. I’ve never done this before, so that’s why I’m calling it the pilot.

Friday at 11 a.m. I’ll be “on the air” talking about the Tigers offseason and this whole Jack Wilson business. If you go to the ustream.tv site you’ll see the video and a chat box where you can mock me and ask questions. If things go as planned I’ll have the show recorded and I’ll post it later.

Hopefully you can tune in. Hopefully it works. Hopefully I don’t suck.

Trade Rumors

Jack Wilson post

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No time to post now (day job and all), but there are rumors and denials about a Jack Wilson trade and I know people want to discuss it.

Here’s the link to MLB Trade Rumors which will be on top of this.

UPDATED: So there are more rumors and denials. All linked at the MLBTR link above. The buzz is so strong that it makes me think that this is close to happening, but the buzz is so all-over-the-place it makes me think it might be a load of crap.

It’s hard to offer up analysis without knowing any parameters, but I’ll wing it.

Money

When the Tigers declined offering Renteria arbitration because they didn’t want to be exposed to the possibility of a $9 million commitment, I figured that it had killed Wilson rumors. Wilson makes $7.5 million which is not significantly less than Renteria, plus there’s that whole thing about having to trade players.

Now in some of the reports it has the Pirates picking up the bulk of the salary, which is good in the sense that the Tigers are trying to achieve some sort of benefit here. It’s bad from the sense that Detroit is looking to the Pirates for cash. This really deserves a post of its own.

Is he an upgrade?

Wilson isn’t an upgrade over Renteria. If you see comments 12, 17, and 20 below, both players are about a half win below average. Wilson gets his value on defense while Renteria gets his on offense. Yes Renteria had a down year, but he still maintained a high line drive rate and improved dramatically in the second half.

Wilson is coming off an injury plagued season, but in his time on the diamond he was excellent at short (+16 in Fielding Bible). Of course with smaller samples comes greater opportunity for flukiness as well. Still, Wilson profiles at least as an above average defender. At the same time he’s another NL’er and would need that requisite adjusting thing.

What would the Tigers have to give up?

Probably too much, or at least it will feel like it. They want a stop gap, and the Pirates want prospects. So the Tigers are giving up something of future value for a one year rental of an average-ish player in a year where there intentions of competing or cutting costs seem to be diametrically opposed.

In terms of names…I’m not the guy to ask. I never thought they’d have to give up Jurrjens and Hernandez for Renteria.

What else could they do?

Adam Everett’s name got tossed out in one report today. He really is the ultimate all glove no hit guy. In his defensive prime he was 40 plays above average. But he’s really been hampered by injuries the last 2 years and you have to wonder if it will hurt his range. But he should be really cheap. Like Santiago cheap.

Cesar Izturis is another name I’d like to see linked to the Tigers. He isn’t as good as Wilson, in fact he’s a win worse with the bat and a little better with the glove, but if it’s cost cutting that’s in store, why not sacrifice a win to save $6 million or prospects?

I’m not opposed to Wilson, but I just hope that if it happens the Tigers don’t overpay for what could very likely be an inconsequential player. Stay tuned. I’ll talk more about this if it happens. Also, I will be streaming live at 11 a.m. ET tomorrow and will likely be discussing this more then.

2009 Season, Fan Experience

They don’t care who my Tiger is anymore

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News out of Comerica Park is that the Who’s Your Tiger campaign has come to an end. It had been 3 years and they probably got more mileage out of it than could have been expected. But I’ll kind of miss it. The campaign and the resurgence of the franchise went hand in hand. As the team became successful it was a way for fans to identify with Tigers and was pretty damn effective. Between Who’s Your Tiger, Hockeytown, and Going to Work, Detroit sports teams have done a nice job of latching on to their fans. Do you believe in now?

Links

links for 2008-12-02

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2009 Season, Free Agents

Other arbitration news

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With the unfortunate news of the Tigers decision about Edgar Renteria and arbitration out of the way it’s probably worth looking at some potential Tigers targets and whether or not they were offered arbitration.

One potential target at closer who is a Type A is Trevor Hoffman. The Padres didn’t offer Hoffman arbitration which means no draft pick compensation and it certainly makes him more attractive. Another less likely Type A closer is Kerry Wood who also didn’t receive an arbitration offer from the Cubs. He is probably cost-prohibitive, but worth mentioning.

The Tigers have also been linked to Darren Oliver. However he is a Type A and the Angels did offer him arbitration meaning the Tigers would surrender their second round pick to sign him. That would certainly be more palatable had they picked up some extra draft picks along the way but I digress.

The always valuable MLBTradeRumors has been updating his list of free agents with arbitration status, so check back tomorrow for the complete run down.