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Tigers Have Just One Guaranteed Contract Beyond 2020 Season

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2020 salary terms are set to be hammered out in the coming days. But what about what’s owed to players beyond that point? The near-term economic picture remains questionable at best. That’ll make teams all the more cautious with guaranteed future salaries.

Every organization has some amount of future cash committed to players, all of it done before the coronavirus pandemic swept the globe. There are several different ways to look at salaries; for instance, for purposes of calculating the luxury tax, the average annual value is the touchstone, with up-front bonuses spread over the life of the deal. For this exercise, we’ll focus on actual cash outlays that still have yet to be paid.

We’ll run through every team, with a big assist from the Cot’s Baseball Contracts database. Next up is the Tigers … whose list features just one man but a fair bit of money:

(click to expand/view detail list)

Tigers Total Future Cash Obligation: $102MM

*includes buyout of 2024 club option over Miguel Cabrera

*2024-25 club options over Cabrera ($30MM apiece) vest with top-10 finish in 2023 MVP voting

Which 15 Players Should The Tigers Protect In An Expansion Draft?

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In a few weeks, we’ll be running a two-team mock expansion draft here at MLBTR.  Currently, we’re creating 15-player protected lists for each of the existing 30 teams.  You can catch up on the rules for player eligibility here.

So far, we’ve done the Indians, White Sox, Rays, Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays, and Orioles.  The Tigers are next.

We’ll start by removing free agents Jordan Zimmermann, Cameron Maybin, Ivan Nova, Austin Romine, Jonathan Schoop, and C.J. Cron from consideration.

Miguel Cabrera goes on the protected list by virtue of his no-trade clause.  We’ll also add the Tigers’ vaunted trio of pitching prospects, who have a 2020 ETA: Casey Mize, Matt Manning, and Tarik Skubal.  I’ll put Matthew Boyd on the list as well.  So we’ll lock these five down:

Casey Mize
Matt Manning
Tarik Skubal
Matthew Boyd
Miguel Cabrera

With a lot of flexibility on their protected list, the Tigers would be in a good position to make some trades with other clubs with tighter lists.  We’re left with 10 spots for these 23 players:

Tyler Alexander
Jeimer Candelario
Harold Castro
Willi Castro
Jose Cisnero
Travis Demeritte
Buck Farmer
Michael Fulmer
Bryan Garcia
Niko Goodrum
Grayson Greiner
Eric Haase
Joe Jimenez
JaCoby Jones
Dawel Lugo
David McKay
Daniel Norris
Victor Reyes
Jake Rogers
John Schreiber
Gregory Soto
Christin Stewart
Spencer Turnbull

With that, we turn it over to the MLBTR readership! In the poll below, select exactly ten players you think the Tigers should protect in our upcoming mock expansion draft. Click here to view the results.

Create your own user feedback survey

An Argument For Casey Mize To Make Tigers' Roster

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  • Righty Casey Mize, the No. 1 pick in the 2018 draft, may be the best prospect in the Detroit organization. But with a minor league campaign unlikely to happen, Mize could miss out on further professional seasoning this year. So what’s the solution? Well, Evan Woodbery of MLive.com makes a case that the Tigers should just put him in their rotation this season. Doing so would burn a year of service time, and it’s unlikely Mize would help make the Tigers a playoff-caliber team even in a shortened season, but there’s no denying he is one of the most talented players in the organization. Mize spent the majority of last year in Double-A, where he pitched to a 3.20 ERA with 8.69 K/9 and 2.06 BB/9 in 78 2/3 innings.

Tigers Get A Good Run From A Budget Pickup

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Niko Goodrum’s lone brush with free agency lasted all of eight days. Cut loose by the Twins at the end of the 2017 season after eight largely uninspiring seasons in the minors, Goodrum signed a minor league deal with the rebuilding Tigers. A last-place club signing a little-known non-prospect drew about as much attention as you’d expect: virtually none. Goodrum got a quick 115-word write-up here at MLBTR after his agents announced the signing on Twitter. You’d be hard-pressed to find any sort of lengthy column penned at the time of the signing. It was a garden-variety minor league depth pickup.

Goodrum somewhat surprisingly broke camp with the Tigers in 2018 and received sparse playing time that April (19 games, 10 starts). By mid-May, he was hitting under .200 with a sub-.600 OPS. It wouldn’t have been a surprise to see the Tigers cut bait, but the versatile switch-hitter slowly began to turn things around. After his OPS bottomed out at .597 two years ago to the day — Goodrum bounced back with a .253/.320/.450 slash in his final 428 plate appearances. Along the way, he played all four infield positions and both outfield corners. He finished out the season with a slightly above-average batting line, per wRC+, coupling that with good baserunning.

An average hitter whose manager feels comfortable slotting him pretty much anywhere on the diamond would be a shoo-in for most rosters, and given the state of the Tigers, it was clear that Goodrum had punched his ticket to a 2019 roster spot. Goodrum added center field to his defensive resume early in the 2019 season, but as the year wore on and Jordy Mercer struggled with injuries, he found himself seeing more and more time at shortstop.

The Tigers surely value Goodrum’s versatility, but his strong work at short in sporadic batches this past season should ensure that he opens the year as the Tigers’ everyday option at that position. In just 326 innings there, Goodrum tallied 4 Defensive Runs Saved, a 3.2 Ultimate Zone Rating and 6 Outs Above Average. Among the 38 players who played at least 300 innings at shortstop this past season, Goodrum’s 8.6 UZR/150 ranked seventh.

With the bat, Goodrum took a slight step back but still turned in a solid enough .248/.322/.421 with 12 homers and 12 steals apiece. There’s some reason for additional optimism, too, as Goodrum had an above-average hard-hit rate and upped his walk rate from 8.5 percent in 2018 to 9.7 percent in 2019. And despite an unassuming stolen base total, Goodrum ranked in the 92nd percentile of MLB players in terms of average sprint speed. He’s been successful in 77 percent of his career stolen base attempts (24-for-31), so there’s room for him to create some additional value on the basepaths. Making consistent contact has been a problem for Goodrum, though it’s also worth pointing out that his spike in punchouts last year coincided with some knee and groin injuries over the summer. He still whiffed in 26.8 percent of his 2018 plate appearances, so contact will probably continune to be an issue, but last year’s near-30 percent mark might be higher than should be expected.

If there’s work to be done for Goodrum, it’s in handling certain pitches. The 28-year-old feasted on fastballs (.320/.412/582) and curvevalls (.280/.321/.460) but took home a participation award against most other offerings. Changeups befuddled him (.193/.230/.337), and sliders were downright unfair to him (.157/.214/.216). Given those woeful slash lines, it’s not surprising to see that Goodrum had a swinging-strike rate greater than 20 percent against both those pitch types.

Goodrum clearly isn’t a star, but the Tigers can control him for four more seasons and he won’t be arbitration-eligible until this winter. A plus defensive shortstop with high-end speed and even average skills at the plate is a nice piece to have, though, and if Goodrum can maintain his stellar glovework at short over a larger sample, he’s the type of player who could surprise a lot of onlookers with a three- or four-WAR season. The Tigers have reportedly received trade interest in him in the past, and given the positives laid out here, that’ll likely continue in the future.

Goodrum’s trajectory in some ways mirrors that of Marwin Gonzalez (sans the trash can, presumably), as he’s slowly risen from a versatile defender without much bat to an average switch-hitter who can be be played pretty much anywhere. With the Tigers, that’ll continue to be shortstop, but if he’s eventually traded, he could resume his jack-of-all-trades role. We hear a lot about some of the Tigers’ misses and missed opportunities these days, so it’s only fair to give them credit here for finding an asset that the Twins probably wish they hadn’t let slip through their fingers. They’re the ones who ultimately signed Gonzalez, after all. While it hasn’t been a bad signing, that $21MM might’ve been spent elsewhere if Goodrum were still in the fold.

Latest On Michael Fulmer’s Rehab Progress

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Tigers righty Michael Fulmer appears to be making nice progress in his attempt to rehabilitate following Tommy John surgery. As Chris McCosky of the Detroit News reports, the team finds itself trying to hold him back.

Fulmer is working out at the team’s Florida complex, so it’s not implausible that he could face live hitters. But pitching coach Rick Anderson says there’s “no chance” of that at the moment.

Though it seems Fulmer is fully on track from a physical perspective, the team understandably wishes to proceed in a measured and cautious manner. Anderson suggests that the team would like to build Fulmer up slowly from live bullpen sessions into sim game action.

It’s tempting to think that moving ahead now could set Fulmer up to be ready at the start of the season. But the team is understandably concerned with unleashing Fulmer without full oversight and structure in place. The 27-year-old was once and could again be a key asset for a Detroit organization that is firmly in rebuilding mode at present.

[RELATED: A Missed Opportunity For The Tigers?]

Fulmer is controllable through the 2022 season, so the team is wisely taking the long view. That’s probably best for him as well. Fulmer battled knee and other health issues even before blowing out his ulnar collateral ligament. If he’s to return to the quality pitching he provided in 2016-17, Fulmer will need to return to and remain at full health.

Jordan Zimmermann Discusses Future

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Righty Jordan Zimmermann is entering the final season of his contract with the Tigers. While his time in Detroit is coming to a close, the 33-year-old says he won’t hang up his spikes when the deal expires, as Chris McCosky of the Detroit News writes.

Zimmermann says he’s “not thinking about retirement now” and intends to “just take it one year at a time.” Instead, he’s focus on finding solutions on the mound — in particular, polishing the sinker that he increasingly utilized in 2019.

“Yeah, I thought about retiring a few years ago, but coming into spring training this year, I felt really good,” Zimmermann tells McCosky. “I haven’t had any issues. I still have the drive and I still love the game.”

Zimmermann has always put in the effort but hasn’t had the results since moving to Detroit. He gave the Nationals over a thousand frames of 3.32 ERA ball, setting the stage for a $110MM deal with the Tigers. But Zimmermann has struggled with injuries and has limped to a brutal 5.61 ERA in his 508 2/3 innings over the past four seasons.

Zimmermann is owed $25MM for the 2020 campaign, though he’s likely to earn only a portion of that due to the shortened season. He no longer has full no-trade rights — he can block deals to all but ten teams — so it’s possible he could be moved during the season if he’s able to bounce back.

Tigers Focusing On Spencer Torkelson As Top Pick?

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  • There seems to be an increasing expectation that the Tigers will take Arizona State first baseman Spencer Torkelson with the first overall pick in the amateur draft, according to both Lynn Henning of the Detroit News and Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free Press.  While nothing will be certain until Torkelson’s name is called, the slugger is considered the top prospect available by many pundits, and is perhaps something of a safer pick.  Perfect Game national director Brian Sakowski tells Fenech that the lack of spring baseball created less opportunity for any prospect to showcase new skills or have a breakout performance, so while Vanderbilt’s Austin Martin may not necessarily be behind Torkelson on Detroit’s draft board, the lack of clarity about Martin’s future defensive position might inspire the Tigers to just go with Torkelson’s more obvious power potential.  Henning is even more straight-forward in his assessment, writing “the Tigers are all but certain to take Torkelson,” as he would immediate become the headline bat in a Detroit farm system that is rich in quality young arms but short on blue chip hitting prospects.

Latest Tigers News & Notes

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Picking first in the upcoming draft won’t be quite as advantageous as usual, as the Tigers will only have between five and ten rounds to utilize their advantage. But it’s still an exciting opportunity to infuse big-time talent into an organization that has patiently awaited a return to competitiveness. The Tigers are sorting through a long list of possibilities; you can familiarize yourself with many of them by checking out Baseball America’s first top 500 draft prospect list.

Here’s the latest from the Detroit organization:

  • Tigers analytics chief Jay Sartori held an interesting chat with Cody Stavenhagen of The Athletic (subscription link) about the team’s efforts to construct an analytics department over the past several years. He now oversees a “robust staff,” he says, after an “incremental” building process that started from a mostly blank slate. Sartori came aboard in November of 2015, not long after Al Avila was hired as GM. So what are the Tigers focused on in this realm? Sartori says it’s the question of how to make “complicated concepts and data sets and pieces of information readily accessible to staff and players?”
  • Making analytics work for ballplayers is now a big part of the job for MLB coaches. Tigers hitting coach Joe Vavra acknowledged that, saying that he’s working on “challenging [hitters] to come out of their comfort zone a little bit” when it comes to data and advanced analysis, as Chris McCosky of the Detroit News reported recently. Applying analytics requires “baby steps” at the start, says Vavra, and the organization is trying to get its players to take as many as possible during the present hiatus. Otherwise, the team is handling all its players differently. For some, Vavra is helping to oversee “rather major adjustments to your mechanics and your swing;” for others, it’s mostly a matter of maintaining conditioning.
  • Detroit pitching coach Rick Anderson also just chatted with media, as Stavenhagen covers in a Twitter thread. Anderson says it was disappointing to see Spring Training halted because he wanted to see more of the team’s slate of prized upper-level pitching prospects. Even more worrying, perhaps, is the lack of anticipated minor-league competition. The organization doesn’t seem to have a clear idea yet as to how it’ll make up for the lost developmental opportunity, though obviously that’s an industry-wide issue.
  • Though the focus remains largely on the future, the Tigers did go out and make some notable potential improvements to the MLB infield mix. McCosky examines a unit that now includes anticipated regular veterans in most spots. C.J. Cron, Jonathan Schoop, and Austin Romine are slated to earn a combined $16.3MM — at least, in a full 2020 season. The shortstop position was due to feature Niko Goodrum and Jordy Mercer, with third base handled by Jeimer Candelario and/or other unproven players such as Dawel Lugo and Isaac Paredes. While most of the options on the left side of the infield will remain under team control beyond 2020, the new additions were all on one-year pacts. McCosky looks at the potential line of succession in all areas.

How The Reds Got Their 49-HR Man

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The Reds’ Eugenio Suarez has morphed into one of the majors’ most valuable third basemen over the past few years. Dating back to 2017, Suarez has accounted for 12.3 fWAR – the eighth-highest figure at his position and one that puts him in company with names like Kris Bryant and Josh Donaldson. At this point, it’s fair to call Suarez a cornerstone for the Reds, who signed him to a seven-year extension worth $66MM after his breakout effort in ’17. That now looks like a brilliant move from the team’s perspective, while acquiring him in the first place counts as one of former general manager Walt Jocketty’s shrewdest decisions atop their front office.

Let’s start with how Suarez got to this level after first joining the Tigers as a free agent out of Venezuela in 2008. Within five years, Suarez was regarded among the top five prospects in their system, though he didn’t wow anyone during his lone action in Detroit’s uniform. In his first season in the majors in 2014, Suarez played shortstop and batted .242/.316/.336 (86 wRC+) with 0.9 fWAR over 277 plate appearances and 85 games. The Tigers then shipped him and pitching prospect Jonathon Crawford to Cincinnati for right-hander Alfredo Simon heading into the 2015 season.

Simon was, of course, the headliner when the trade occurred. Then 33 years old, Simon was coming off an All-Star season in which he pitched to a 3.44 ERA/4.33 FIP over 196 1/3 innings. It was just the first season as a full-time starter for Simon, who functioned either as a reliever or a swingman in prior years. Unfortunately for Detroit, it would go down as his sole effective season from the rotation, though that wasn’t entirely surprising.

As MLBTR’s Jeff Todd wrote when the trade happened: “Of course, Simon comes with plenty of questions as to whether he can repeat his effort. ERA estimators were not nearly as high on his work last year. And his ERA ballooned to 4.52 in the second half of the season.”

The Tigers didn’t make the playoffs in 2015, which proved to be Simon’s lone year with the franchise, and he was only able to muster a 5.05 ERA/4.77 FIP in 187 frames along the way. Then-president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, who acquired Simon, didn’t make it through the season. Simon went back to the Reds in free agency thereafter, but he also struggled in his return to Cincy and hasn’t been heard from since at the major league level.

So, buying one year of control over Simon clearly didn’t go as hoped for the Tigers. It gets worse when you consider what they gave up. Sure, Crawford – the Tigers’ first-round pick in 2013 – didn’t amount to anything in the majors. In fact, he never even advanced beyond the High-A level, where he last pitched in 2017. Conversely, Suarez can be counted as one who got away for the Tigers.

It took Suarez until 2017 to truly find his groove in a Reds uniform, but as mentioned, he has established himself as a highly valuable member of the team and someone who could help key their resurgence sometime soon. Now a prolific slugger, Suarez has combined for 130 home runs in the past four seasons. He hit a jaw-dropping 49 last year to finish second in the majors, trailing only Mets Rookie of the Year winner Pete Alonso. Additionally, Suarez managed a .271/.358/.572 line (good for a 133 wRC+), totaled a personal-high 4.5 fWAR and missed a mere three of the Reds’ 162 games.

Suarez, still just 28, is on track to stay a Red through at least 2024. He’ll make reasonable salaries ranging from $9.25MM to $11MM through then, and the Reds will have a decision to make on a club option come 2025 ($15MM guarantee versus $2MM buyout). By FanGraphs’ estimate, Suarez’s production in Cincinnati has already been worth around $116MM. All the Tigers got for parting with that was a disappointing season from Simon, and they still haven’t found a clear answer at third since moving on from Suarez.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Casey Mize Still Hopes To Debut In 2020

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  • High-end Tigers pitching prospect Casey Mize is holding out hope that he’ll make his major league debut in 2020, as Chris McCosky of the Detroit News writes. “It is very frustrating,” Mize told McCosky the coronavirus-forced shutdown. “This is the year I’d hoped to spend a lot of quality time in the big leagues and make my debut. And if there is a season, that is still my goal. That is still something I want to accomplish.” The 22-year-old Mize is keeping in shape by throwing five days a week, including a 40-pitch bullpen session every Wednesday. The No. 1 pick in the 2018 draft, Mize further proved himself as one of the best prospects in baseball last year when he threw 78 2/3 innings of 3.20 ERA ball during his Double-A debut.
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