Tigers President Hints Mariners Slugger Would Have Flopped In Detroit

The Seattle Mariners and Detroit Tigers recently concluded an epic battle in the American League Division Series, and unfortunately, someone had to go home.

After a Jorge Polanco walk-off single sent the Tigers packing, the Mariners raced out to a 2-0 series lead over the Toronto Blue Jays in their quest for their first AL pennant. Meanwhile, all the Tigers have been able to do is sit back and reflect on what could have been.

However, in the process of that reflection, Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris recently took a thinly-veiled shot at a Mariners player.

Harris strongly hints Eugenio Suárez was available to Tigers

In the Tigers' season-ending press conference on Monday, Harris was asked about the team's relatively underwhelming trade deadline, and he strongly hinted that Detroit could have landed third baseman Eugenio Suárez, who instead returned to the Mariners in a deal that sent three young players to the Arizona Diamondbacks

“The players most closely connected to us via the media would have cost either a player on our postseason roster plus additional pieces or one of our top prospects plus additional pieces," Harris said, per Evan Woodberry of MLive. Some of those players didn’t perform down the stretch, would have been free agents in two months, and would have cost us players who actually performed better and are controllable for the future.

“We probably would’ve gotten an ‘A’ on the trade grades that day and plenty of praise in the coverage, only to see those players underperform while the ones we kept performed better and will help us beyond this year. I don’t regret those deals at all. I’m proud of our group for evaluating our players well and believing they’d help us this year and beyond.”

The strangest part of Harris' comments were that he all but confirmed the player he could have traded for was Suárez -- right after saying he couldn't discuss which players he could have traded for. But back to the point...

Suárez hit 49 home runs this season, tying a career-high. But Harris was accurate (assuming he was talking about Suárez) in depicting the 34-year-old's struggles after the deadline. He batted .189 with a .653 OPS in 53 regular-season games, and is now 4-for-29 in the playoffs as of Tuesday.

However, Suárez's lone postseason home run did provide a big blow in the Mariners' 8-4 win over the Tigers in Game 3 last week.

Ultimately, Harris can feel however he wants about not landing Suárez. But the Mariners aren't exactly lamenting the loss of Tyler Locklear or Hunter Cranton yet. And if the slugger has a ring on his finger at the end of the season, there will never be reason to regret taking a shot on him at the deadline.

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