What Kind of Team The Detroit Tigers Are Trying to Be in 2026
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It seems like just yesterday, fans were on their couches, yelling at their televisions during the 2025 World Series. Now, Opening Day is a handful of weeks away. Some ballclubs have emerged this offseason as serious threats, while others are still rebuilding.
The Detroit Tigers are a team that is ready to win now, and as cheesy as it may sound, this ballclub is simply trying to be a team in 2026. Not a bunch of individual superstars, but a group of players ready for postseason redemption.
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Focusing on the end goal is never what a victorious organization does; instead, the Tigers need to focus on coming together and finishing a season. Last year, their demise was of historic proportions, and it didn't matter that they had the best pitcher in baseball as well as a pair of Silver Sluggers and a Gold Glove winner.
The 2025 season featured a team that looked impossible to beat as the first to 30-wins, then 40, then 50, and then 60. However, that same group of guys ended up losing a double-digit lead in the AL Central and failed to make it to the ALCS.
The Tigers are trying to be a band of brothers in 2026, or they could face the exact same fate that the last two seasons have held for them, sent home in the American League Divisional Series.
Eerily Similar Squad
No unfamiliar players will step up to the plate at the beginning of the year, as the Tigers' offseason was highlighted by additional arms to their starting rotation, not any hitters. That means these guys should be increasingly familiar with one another.
*Note this is not an official starting lineup, just a prediction*
- First Base: Spencer Torkelson
- Second Base: Gleyber Torres
- Third Base: Zach McKinstry
- Shortstop: Javier Báez
- Left: Riley Greene
- Center: Parker Meadows
- Right: Kerry Carpenter
- Catcher: Dillon Dingler
- Designated Hitter: Colt Keith
The fact that Dillon Dingler is able to stand let alone make this throw after 14 innings of crouching is a minor miracle pic.twitter.com/BQjej8Mbvh
— AT (@YankeeWRLD) October 11, 2025
Inidividual honors are incredible, and shouldn't be overlooked. Both Green and McKinstry took home their first Silver Slugger Award, while the man behind the plate (Dingler) was honored with a Gold Glove for his defensive efforts.
Skubal has been the most dominant pitcher in the game (at least in the AL) the last two seasons as he won back-to-back Cy Young Awards, but team sports aren't about the accolades of one, but of the many. The Tigers need to come together this season, banded as one, and they will not only take back the division, but will be playing in the Fall Classic.
Maddy Dickens resides in Loveland, Colorado. She grew up with two older brothers, where their lives revolved around sports. She earned a master's degree in business management from Tarleton State University while simultaneously playing basketball and competing in rodeo at the collegiate level. She successfully parlayed a reserve national championship into a professional rodeo career and now stays involved in upper-level athletics by writing for On SI on several different MLB teams' pages, along with some NCAA sites.