Detroit Tigers Hoping Veteran Pitcher Lives up to Contract Expectations

The Detroit Tigers have a number of promising young players on their pitching staff, but it was a veteran that was the biggest headache last season.

MLB's Thomas Harrigan recently went through a list of 10 free agent signings from last year that have something to prove. Tigers starter Kenta Maeda made the list after a disappointing debut campaign with the team.

Maeda hasn't been as dominant since coming over to America than he was at the start of his career in Japan.

In eight seasons for the Hiroshima Carp, he had a 2.42 career ERA. While he never maintained a high-strikeout rate, he was effective and that drummed up some interest in MLB.

Initially he signed an eight-year, $25 million deal with the Los Angeles Dodgers to start his career. He had a solid few season there, but he really broke out with the Minnesota Twins.

Maeda's best season was the pandemic-shortened 2020 where he posted a 2.70 ERA. Outside of that, he has mostly been solid with a 4.17 ERA.

Detroit picked him up with a two-year, $24 million contract last offseason and it almost immediately backfired on them.

The signing didn't make a ton of sense at the time, as he was coming off a 6-8 season with the Twins. It's possible the Tigers were banking on flipping him at a trade deadline for additional prospects. That still isn't out of the question for this year, but he will need a hot start to gain that sort of value.

Maeda posted a 6.09 ERA over 29 games with the Tigers this season. He came into a year as a starter, but was demoted to a long relief and setup option in the bullpen.

He pitched much better out of the bullpen, so that role could be something for Detroit to consider. He had a 3.86 ERA over 42 innings of relief while his ERA jumped up to 7.42 over 70.1 innings in his starts.

One key difference last year compared to the successful seasons of his career was a career-low in K/9 with just 7.7. The previous low before that was 9.2 in his rookie season.

He wasn't able to get batters to strike out and saw rises in both hits and power generated, a combination that tends to lead to less-than-ideal results.

Detroit has filled out their starting rotation with better options, so Maeda will likely continue with his bullpen role until they need another starter to step up.

With expectations lowered, perhaps the 36-year-old can use this season to bounce back before hitting free agency (or retirement) in 2026.