Detroit Tigers Season Preview: The Future Is Bright, the Present Is Not

Editor's note: Welcome to SI's MLB preview. Click here to view every team's outlook in 2020, including predictions, projections and, yes, a preview of the 2030 preview. Click here to read the Tigers fantasy preview.

The Tigers made history in 2019, joining the Pirates, the original Senators, the Orioles and the Mets as the only franchises with multiple 110-loss seasons. They also became the first team in the 2000s to lose 110 games twice, after bowing 119 times in ’03.

By one comprehensive league- and park-adjusted measure (wRC+), Detroit’s offense was the worst of the 21st century—the AL’s worst since the 1972 Rangers’. In a record-setting year for home runs in MLB, when every other team had at least two 20-homer hitters, no Tiger had more than 15. After jettisoning the players from the franchise’s last contender, in ’16, Detroit played last year in the gap between the old, good Tigers and the future, good Tigers. (Niko Goodrum was the team’s best position player, with 1.6 WAR.)

The good news is that ’19 was probably the low point. GM Al Avila has brought in
short-term upgrades, signing second baseman Jonathan Schoop and first baseman C.J. Cron, who combined for 48 homers and played good defense in Minnesota last season. Isaac Paredes hit .282 with 13 homers and a .368 OBP as a 20-year-old in Double A
and could debut this year at shortstop or third. Speedy outfielder Daz Cameron, part of the Justin Verlander trade to Houston, might arrive as well.

The real excitement, though, is on the mound. The Tigers have three of the game’s top prospects in righties Casey Mize (the No. 1 pick in ’18) and Matt Manning (No. 9 in ’16) and lefthander Tarik Skubal, a ninth-round choice in ’18 who was maybe the best pitcher in the minors last year (2.42 ERA, 13.1 Ks per nine between high A and Double-A). By the end of ’20, health permitting, Detroit fans could get a glimpse of the rotation that can win, and maybe even dominate, the AL Central in the mid-’20s. — Joe Sheehan

Projected Record: 54-108, 5th in AL Central

With a lineup practically devoid of power, Detroit won an MLB-low 47 games last season. A couple of veteran upgrades in the infield will yield two or three more wins at most.

Key Question: Will Miguel Cabrera hit his 500th home run?

The Tigers are doomed for another dreadful season, but a healthy Miggy could reasonably hit 23 home runs this season, which would put him at exactly 500 for his Hall of Fame worthy career. He’s also 185 hits away from 3,000, though we’ll almost certainly have to wait till 2021 for that milestone. — Matt Martell

Player Spotlight

Moving Up: Spencer Turnbull, SP

Ignore his 3–17 record. The righty had a 3.99 FIP. But he averaged under five innings a start. With better control, he can work deeper into games.

Moving Down: Miguel Cabrera, DH/1B

The future Hall of Famer, 37 in April, has hardly anything left in the tank. His .282 average in 2019 wasn’t awful, but in a juiced-ball year, he hit just 12 home runs.

Watchability Ranking: Keep a Hand on the Remote

The Tigers have two big things going for them here. You should almost certainly have more fun watching them than you did last year (50 wins, at least, maybe even 60) and you might even get to see Casey Mize and Matt Manning. — Emma Baccellieri

Preview of the 2030 Preview

Casey Mize, SP: It’s easy to forget about Mize’s intermittent health woes when you see a batter swing full force, expecting a fastball, only to have the pitch tumble—slowly at first, then more aggressively, until it spikes into the dirt as the hitter corkscrews himself into the batter’s box. At 32, the righty has relied more and more on the splitter that earned him the ’24 Cy Young (and two other top-three finishes). He has gotten a further boost from the changeup he learned from pitching coach Max Scherzer.) — Craig Goldstein