Key Roles the Detroit Tigers Quietly Locked In During Spring Training
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The Detroit Tigers are just days away from Opening Day this week against the San Diego Padres, and while there are still a couple of roster decisions that need to work themselves out, it has been a very productive spring.
Coming off back-to-back Game 5 defeats in the ALDS, the goal was clear this offseason: put a team on the field which can make a deeper run in October. Time will tell if it actually gets achieved, but fans are about to get their first look.
Largely, roles were assigned already going into the spring, but every year brings position battles and this camp was no different. Here are three roles Detroit has quietly solved throughout the process and look to be locked into to begin the year.
Closer: Kenley Jansen
A case can be made that Jansen was already locked into the closer role ahead of the spring, but it did not take a large sample size for him to confirm that in exhibition games. The veteran threw just four innings for the Tigers and did not give up a run, striking out five and walking just one.
Detroit did not bring in the active saves leader to simply not close games if he was up to it, and Jansen looks the part of an elite closer. This gives the team the potential to deploy Kyle Finnegan and Will Vest in setup roles, potentially forming a very scary bullpen in the Motor City.
After the bullpen was a huge reason for the late season unraveling in 2025, that has to be very exciting for fans.
No. 6 Starter: Drew Anderson
The Tigers are obviously not going with a six-man rotation, but if 2025 proved anything it's that more than five starters are needed to get through a season. Anderson is going to begin the year out of the bullpen in a swingman role, but he is absolutely going to start games for this team.
After what was seen as a head-scratching move when they gave him $7 million to return from the KBO despite his past MLB struggles, Anderson has come in and had an absolutely stellar spring for the team.
Pitching to a a 0.69 ERA across six appearances and striking out 17 with just five walks in 13 innings pitched, Anderson has looked like a star. The moment someone gets hurt or is not producing in the rotation, the right-hander will be waiting, and he may not give that spot up when he takes it.
Center Field: Parker Meadows
For a minute there, it looked like Meadows was going to have a real shot at being left in Triple-A given his struggles last year and brutal start to spring though. Quietly though over the last week or so, the defensive standout has started to come around with the bat.
Raising his slash line this spring to .300/.391/.400 over eight games, Meadows has shown positive signs at the plate, and given how strong he is on defense, him showing anything on offense was going to potentially end the race.
Barring something unforeseen, Meadows will be this team's Opening Day center fielder.
Michael Brauner is a 2022 graduate of the University of Alabama with a degree in Sports Media. He covers various MLB teams across the On SI network and you can also find his work on Yellowhammer News covering the Alabama Crimson Tide and Auburn Tigers as well as on the radio producing and co-hosting 'The Opening Kickoff' every weekday morning on 105.5 WNSP FM in Mobile, Alabama.