gehringer_2

May favorite "hidden perk" was for a while when I had to fly back and forth regularly from DTW to MSP early in the morning. For whatever reason at that time Delta just had open boarding on that first flight. Just walk to the gate and right onto the plane. Maybe because the plane was already there in the morning pre-prepped and ready to go? Don't know why but it was a real throw back to 30yrs earlier when flying was still something to look forward to.

If they don't pursue Torres they could sign Bregman without blocking McGongle (assuming they think he's going to be here in '26) because Baez can finish his contract in CF. Also have to wonder if Anderson is considered a serious prospect or not, '26 is probably now or never for him.

That's kind of a fun idea - the devil would be in the performance metrics. Could destroy team cohesion if done wrong.

Still, even with Kiner-Falefa not doing much with the bat I'd take his chances over the quality of that send.

It's just such a stupid system where Team B ends up paying for the performance a guy already booked with Team A because Team A was able to vastly underpay him when he was performing. Nothing will make sense until they change it, and they probably won't.

Of course OTOH, we could include the 5 yrs you have to pay him for when you are going to get nothing. 🫠

I like Bregman well enough, but I'd like Bregman and Torres as I think the team is too LH'd. But they are not going to cut bait on Keith. So Bregman means Keith goes back to 2nd and they don't pursue Torres. Bregman is prolly the better bat than Torres and a better 3b than Keith but Torres is a better 2b than Keith. It would overall be a step but not a huge one, but that's OK. They were an 87 win team, there aren't big steps left. If you make even a truly serious try for Tucker with so many likely bidders out there you can have little certainty you land him. Lower certainty there than pursuing Bregman anyway. For me signing pitching is all a matter of whether they can get reasonable years.

Yup. I was not impressed with Roberts or his staff. I thought pitching to Ohtani the last time just to walk him after the 4/5 IBBs was stupid too. And who knows, the extra energy to throw those 4 wasted pitches may have been the difference for Little against Freeman.

actually I had it wrong, What I was thinking about was when Kershaw came in in the 12th with the bases loaded. Went to a full count on Lukes and Luke swung at ball 4, but he didn't K, he grounded out 4-3. What I remembered was the walk was there - so same net outcome but not a K

It's true that the uncertainty around '27 is a wild card. I don't really have dog in the fight either way. I just don't want them to do something stupid, which by my definition means if you trade him, it has to be a good trade, if you keep him you better make a good pick on the comp award.

But if this is an issue, isn't it going to be an even bigger issue if he walks for nothing at the end of '26 as compared to getting some talent back this off-season? The players know the set-up as well as anyone. I assume most of them and us want the team to be able to continue to contend beyond '26? I'm not saying it's not a potential issue, just that you are going to face it either way - it's just a matter of when.

SE Mi is not a particularly rich area by national standards anymore and as good as Tiger TV and radio ratings are, as has been noted the ballpark is already too expensive for most local fans and they average 10k empty seats per date. Now granted, Aces pitching drive sellouts. But even if an ACE is worth 15K extra seats and even at $100 profit per seat sold, on 15 home starts that still only $22.5M/yr. From a purely economic standpoint, there is no sense paying someone $40M for that. 🤷‍♂️ Long story short, fan enthusiasm is nice, but it may not pay the bills.

yeah - exactly. I'm sure there is a trade out there that would work to the Tigers advantage, but it's just a fact that few GMs ever make a trade like that. And I think it would have to be at least a three way deal - it has to be a more complex set of swaps to get enough pieces to fit. And since we have never seen Harris swing any kind of complex deal (cf, DD), there is no precedent to expect one.

The conventional wisdom is that owners, particularly big market owners, don't care about operating loses because teams have been appreciating in value exponentially. Of course, that can't go on forever - anything that must come to an end will. But with no intent to be political here, but just to state an economic fact - it's tied to the oligarchy. As long as the rich continue to get richer exponentially, the price they are willing to pay for their toys will continue to follow suit. Now, that said, it doesn't mean the owners still won't try as hard as they can to remake a system to give them capital appreciation AND operating profits.

Wilson was a very good hitter, he probably should have been used a lot more. But he came up in the 50's. Not only was he a black player expected to shut up and be happy, it was also the era of the grey flannel suit when things were done the way they were done, and that was that. And to be honest , that last part didn't change much in baseball until Ohtani.

Certainly possible. No-one has much insight into what kind of animal spirits might become ascendant among the owners.

Not sure who is outraged, but that public perception is going to be different for layoff announcements into an expanding labor market vs one that everyone fears is, or is about to be contracting. The shoe has now dropped at MS and AMA, cuts at META have been smaller so far but will probably get bigger. The big AI investors all find themselves cash poor in the short term.

Jay's batter swung and missed at ball four with the bases loaded in the 17th or 18th (? it's kind of a blur!). The door was open but they couldn't walk through.

IDK if Forbes is to believed, but the teams that are losing the most money are some of the big market spenders, e.g., the Mets and Padres, more than the small market teams -- so that could drive a different kind of dynamic than we've seen in the past. I don't think the current CBA serves the fans well at all and I'd take a long strike if it meant a better system emerged, but I doubt it would.

Maybe this was posted and I missed it, but I just noticed that the Freep did a fan poll about the Skubal and more than 60% of the respondents said to trade him this off-season. Not what I would have guessed.

these kinds of claims are still BS though. In the end, all dollars are fungible. I'm sure there are some donors only interested sports, but there are a lot of donors that might have endowed a 100 scholarships or built a chem lab if they have gotten the same pitch from a different development official.

jays can hope Ohtani is run down tomorrow.

The Empire Strikes Back (tie game)

If you are adding up wasted money, don't forget to add the ~$30M UM has cost itself in fines. Who gets those $ I wonder?

Funny number: They bested Cle on treys by one attempt 11/34 vs 11/35. Go figure.