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6/11/24 6:40PM Nationals @ Tigers


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7 hours ago, Tiger337 said:

Like others have mentioned here, all the platooning is good for offense, but it probably hurts the defense to have guys trying to play multiple positions.  I don't know how much is gained offensively versus lost defensively.  

I don't think platooning was the issue in this game.  4 runs on 1 swing.  Key errors by Kreidler (a SS playing SS) and Rogers (a C playing C).

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I suspect that I am a minority here, or maybe even the only one, but I’ve come around to the idea that when Al Avila was finally given the gate and Scott Harris came onboard, we basically had to start in on a new rebuild.

Avila’s seven years turned out to be complete toilet time, and if he moved us forward at all, it was only because he got a few building blocks into the system before he left (although it looks like only one of the players he actually tanked for, Riley, might end up paying out the way we hope he might). Any other building blocks he got, chiefly Skubal, were chosen late enough in the draft that we didn’t have to tank for them at all.

But the point is, the seven years in which Avila peter-principled into and stumbled his way through the job were completely wasted in terms of rebuilding the team into a winner, so we had no choice to start all over. So I no longer have any expectations at all that we will compete this year, and I will be pleasantly surprised, rather than expectant, that we will seriously compete next year. I don’t think we can reasonably expect to be actually competitive until Harris and company, who have been fully in control of the organization and its development for less than a season and a half, have finally cleared out the dregs that they inherited and have established this as fully being the result of their work.

I understand that this will make many here angry, and I accept it will be interpreted as and played back as me wanting the Tigers to lose games and wanting tank some more—which isn’t true at all—but that’s the conclusion I’ve come to after careful consideration, and now I have shred it, so I have no choice now but to own that.

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1 minute ago, RatkoVarda said:

this may be true; but Harris' words and actions are not those of a guy who thinks he is starting over.

stop bull****ting people and blow it up if it needs to be blown up

Equivocating to win the pr war.

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You are not in the minority.

Avila may have done things behind the scenes, and bringing in some guy that means you can't call it a total waste, but in terms of ML development... yeah.  These players just aren't that good.

 

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I don't want to see them "tank" again.  It's a poor strategy, especially with the new draft order rules.  It's not good for the game and it's not the surefire way back to contention some fans think it is.  It means a few years of automatic losing with no guarantee of success.  I'd rather they try to be a .500 team now and try to improve incrementally from there.  Some may disagree, but I like this year's .500 team a lot better than the 95 and 100 loss-teams of the recent pass.    

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It's a bad organization no doubt; a future successful team hangs on every single player working out and staying healthy - which never happens

I am struck that at Erie and WMI combined, they have 2 guys total who, if you squint, may be ML regular position players - Campos and Lee (who Harris acquired). And then a few guys who will be very lucky to reach Zach McKinstry level. That is pure incompetence.

if they are waiting on McGonigle and Clark, well then wake me in 3 years

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51 minutes ago, chasfh said:

I suspect that I am a minority here, or maybe even the only one, but I’ve come around to the idea that when Al Avila was finally given the gate and Scott Harris came onboard, we basically had to start in on a new rebuild.

Avila’s seven years turned out to be complete toilet time, and if he moved us forward at all, it was only because he got a few building blocks into the system before he left (although it looks like only one of the players he actually tanked for, Riley, might end up paying out the way we hope he might). Any other building blocks he got, chiefly Skubal, were chosen late enough in the draft that we didn’t have to tank for them at all.

But the point is, the seven years in which Avila peter-principled into and stumbled his way through the job were completely wasted in terms of rebuilding the team into a winner, so we had no choice to start all over. So I no longer have any expectations at all that we will compete this year, and I will be pleasantly surprised, rather than expectant, that we will seriously compete next year. I don’t think we can reasonably expect to be actually competitive until Harris and company, who have been fully in control of the organization and its development for less than a season and a half, have finally cleared out the dregs that they inherited and have established this as fully being the result of their work.

I understand that this will make many here angry, and I accept it will be interpreted as and played back as me wanting the Tigers to lose games and wanting tank some more—which isn’t true at all—but that’s the conclusion I’ve come to after careful consideration, and now I have shred it, so I have no choice now but to own that.

How soft is the rebuild? They haven't been trying to compete first two years and I feel like we are still running in place. We have one core player(Greene) and a whole of maybes.

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18 minutes ago, RatkoVarda said:

this may be true; but Harris' words and actions are not those of a guy who thinks he is starting over.

stop bull****ting people and blow it up if it needs to be blown up

I think Harris is acknowledging that we truly are in a rebuild, but he’s being careful with what he says about it because he doesn’t want to scare away fans by saying, in that many words, that this is a rebuild so strap in. But reading between the lines of his interviews, he has said that we won’t go after free agents until the building blocks of a contender are in place. 

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46 minutes ago, chasfh said:

I suspect that I am a minority here, or maybe even the only one, but I’ve come around to the idea that when Al Avila was finally given the gate and Scott Harris came onboard, we basically had to start in on a new rebuild.

Avila’s seven years turned out to be complete toilet time, and if he moved us forward at all, it was only because he got a few building blocks into the system before he left (although it looks like only one of the players he actually tanked for, Riley, might end up paying out the way we hope he might). Any other building blocks he got, chiefly Skubal, were chosen late enough in the draft that we didn’t have to tank for them at all.

But the point is, the seven years in which Avila peter-principled into and stumbled his way through the job were completely wasted in terms of rebuilding the team into a winner, so we had no choice to start all over. So I no longer have any expectations at all that we will compete this year, and I will be pleasantly surprised, rather than expectant, that we will seriously compete next year. I don’t think we can reasonably expect to be actually competitive until Harris and company, who have been fully in control of the organization and its development for less than a season and a half, have finally cleared out the dregs that they inherited and have established this as fully being the result of their work.

I understand that this will make many here angry, and I accept it will be interpreted as and played back as me wanting the Tigers to lose games and wanting tank some more—which isn’t true at all—but that’s the conclusion I’ve come to after careful consideration, and now I have shred it, so I have no choice now but to own that.

Yeah, I have to agree. Harris hasn't been here long enough to draft and develop players. His trades and free agent signings are very underwhelming though, I get that. Avila ended up getting very little for the established players he was forced to move on from. And all that losing didn't get us good drafts, I would say that was more bad luck than it was mistakes. It would have been nice to get a Bobby Witt Jr. but we got a Torkelson and Mize. They weren't draft mistakes, they were highly regarded as the best players available. If Harris ends up being successful, it may not be for a few more years. Other teams rebuild much quicker so I don't know if he's been instructed to keep payroll low or not.

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18 minutes ago, oblong said:

You are not in the minority.

Avila may have done things behind the scenes, and bringing in some guy that means you can't call it a total waste, but in terms of ML development... yeah.  These players just aren't that good.

 

If Avila may have done things behind the scenes, I have no idea what those things might have been that have been carried over by this regime. Anything I might speculate would be just that. 

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11 minutes ago, Tiger337 said:

I don't want to see them "tank" again.  It's a poor strategy, especially with the new draft order rules.  It's not good for the game and it's not the surefire way back to contention some fans think it is.  It means a few years of automatic losing with no guarantee of success.  I'd rather they try to be a .500 team now and try to improve incrementally from there.  Some may disagree, but I like this year's .500 team a lot better than the 95 and 100 loss-teams of the recent pass.    

And I don’t think they have any plans to tank in the way we think of teams tanking. If they trade Skubal, then that’s tanking. If they trade Flaherty, I would say that’s not tanking.

I do think they are putting together enough of a team to try to be .500 at least. 

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13 minutes ago, RatkoVarda said:

It's a bad organization no doubt; a future successful team hangs on every single player working out and staying healthy - which never happens

I am struck that at Erie and WMI combined, they have 2 guys total who, if you squint, may be ML regular position players - Campos and Lee (who Harris acquired). And then a few guys who will be very lucky to reach Zach McKinstry level. That is pure incompetence.

if they are waiting on McGonigle and Clark, well then wake me in 3 years

Unless Flaherty falls apart or gets hurt, I think Harris will be able to flip him for near-major-league-ready position player(s), and at the risk of disappointment, I assume he will be successful until he shows me he won’t be. I am confident it will not be an Avila return. 

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1 minute ago, chasfh said:

And I don’t think they have any plans to tank in the way we think of teams tanking. If they trade Skubal, then that’s tanking. If they trade Flaherty, I would say that’s not tanking.

I do think they are putting together enough of a team to try to be .500 at least. 

Whether or not trading Flaherty is "tanking" depends on how far they are behind in the wildcard race at the deadline and how much they get for him.  

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How about taking the Milwaukee Brewers approach. Lose your President of Baseball Operations, lose your manager, and trade your Cy Young Award winner. I’d be good with an ownership change above all.

 

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9 minutes ago, kdog said:

How soft is the rebuild? They haven't been trying to compete first two years and I feel like we are still running in place. We have one core player(Greene) and a whole of maybes.

I’m not completely sure what you’re trying to get across here, but I do think neither Harris nor anyone else in the organization believes that this is the end of the rebuild and we are ready to compete for a ring now. Until we get to that point, the rebuild is on.

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9 minutes ago, Sports_Freak said:

Yeah, I have to agree. Harris hasn't been here long enough to draft and develop players. His trades and free agent signings are very underwhelming though, I get that. Avila ended up getting very little for the established players he was forced to move on from. And all that losing didn't get us good drafts, I would say that was more bad luck than it was mistakes. It would have been nice to get a Bobby Witt Jr. but we got a Torkelson and Mize. They weren't draft mistakes, they were highly regarded as the best players available. If Harris ends up being successful, it may not be for a few more years. Other teams rebuild much quicker so I don't know if he's been instructed to keep payroll low or not.

Given how Ilitch was willing to spend after 2021 when Avila convinced him that we were ready to win, I really doubt that he is instructing Harris to keep payroll low first, and make everything else subservient to that imperative.

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27 minutes ago, chasfh said:

If Avila may have done things behind the scenes, I have no idea what those things might have been that have been carried over by this regime. Anything I might speculate would be just that. 

There was the talk about building their new analytics center (project Caesar) and he brought in Sartori and Mezin, who are still around.  He hired Ryan Garko. 

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THere doesn't need to be a tank type rebuild.  I think Scott's team is good enough so that the team will always be around .500, like we have now.   


I just hope they are working through the hitting issues properly and if these guys struggles are due to coaching and approach then that gets addressed.  It seems kind of hard to be this bad at the plate across the board without it being structural but what do i know?

 

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1 hour ago, chasfh said:

I’m not completely sure what you’re trying to get across here, but I do think neither Harris nor anyone else in the organization believes that this is the end of the rebuild and we are ready to compete for a ring now. Until we get to that point, the rebuild is on.

I know we're not ready to compete. But the current core we have won't be on the same time cycle as the next wave of prospects. When the Clark/McGonigble/Jobe wave is ready, Skubal and Greene will be aging out due to contract or other reasons. So how do we try and maximize what we have now while we wait? Or ar we just waiting?

I've seen the Avila inertia plan. Lose in the majors and hope and pray that your high draft picks turn into something. Harris isn't doing that. I need to see his first bold move that declares his timeline. Right now, it's very hazy in my opinion.

 

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1 hour ago, Tiger337 said:

Whether or not trading Flaherty is "tanking" depends on how far they are behind in the wildcard race at the deadline and how much they get for him.  

I think if we have a wild card spot in hand at the deadline, or at least a 50% chance to get one, we might hang onto him. If all we have is a mathematical chance, I don’t think that will be enough to justify holding onto him. We simply don’t have the basis of team in a position to consistently contend. Harris is going to have to get us there before we start buying at the deadline. 

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