Yesterday, the Tigers agreed to make Miguel Cabrera the highest paid player in baseball history. If you look at the entirety of their future financial commitments to him as one single entity rather than two separate agreements, then this is the biggest contract in U.S. sports history. Over the next decade, the Tigers have agreed to pay Cabrera $292 million, a staggering figure for any player, and even more stunning given the context in which it was handed out. Cabrera turns 31 in less than a month. He wasn’t eligible to hit the free agent market for another two years. The contract begins with his age-33 season, and yet, without the benefit of free agency as leverage, he got more for eight years than Robinson Cano got for 10.

As you might imagine, I have a lot of thoughts about this contract. They don’t all agree with each other. So, let’s just go through the things I believe about this deal.

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Over the last few years, we’ve seen several players with stalled markets become the beneficiary of an unexpected serious injury. Prince Fielder failed to generate interest at the price that he was asking until Victor Martinez blew out his knee and the Tigers suddenly had an opening in their line-up. Ervin Santana apparently wasn’t all that interested in playing in Baltimore or Toronto, so Kris Medlen’s elbow problems led him to Atlanta. One team’s needs in November and December might not be the same as their needs in February or March, and while players who sign late generally get less money than players who sign early, needs can develop that increase demand for a player closer to Opening Day.

So, naturally, when news broke on Saturday that Jose Iglesias was going to miss at least four months and maybe the entire season, all eyes turned to Stephen Drew. He’s the only free agent SS of substance left on the market, a solid contributor who held down the position for the defending World Champs a year ago and would perhaps even be an upgrade over Iglesias for the 2014 season. Drew’s market has been essentially non-existent at the price that Scott Boras is asking for, but the Tigers make all kinds of sense for Drew.

They’re a contender with a sudden need for a shortstop, they pick towards the end of the first round, they’ve historically been willing to give up draft picks to sign free agents, and they’re a strong contender with a real shot at winning the World Series. Once Iglesias’ injury became known, the general assumption is that Drew would be in camp with the Tigers within a few days. Except the obvious fit isn’t such an obvious fit for Dave Dombrowski, who has reportedly suggested to local media that he will not pursue Drew as a replacement for Iglesias. And in this instance, I think he’s entirely correct: the Tigers do not need Stephen Drew.

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So here’s the deal for the Tigers: they were planning to run with a platoon of Andy Dirks and Rajai Davis in left field. Davis is still his ordinary, healthy, surprisingly-33-year-old self. Dirks, however, is hurt, and he’s going to have back surgery, and the timetable has him maybe returning in three months. Neither the injury nor the procedure is expected to jeopardize Dirks’ career, but he’ll miss a lot of time in this year’s first half. The Tigers have a problem because one of their projected regulars won’t be able to be a regular for some time, and the guys behind regulars are worse than the regulars are.

The Tigers are trying to be a playoff team, so on the heels of the Dirks announcement, the natural question is, what’ll they do to patch this? Suddenly, the team has an obvious weakness. Playoff teams ought to address their obvious weaknesses. If you’ve mentally skipped ahead, perhaps you’ve concluded that this won’t actually be that big of a deal. It turns out I agree with you, but wait, I have several hundred words of explanation! Don’t go!

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Earlier today, polite and Canadian and polite Marc Hulet published his 2014 organizational prospect list for the Detroit Tigers.

It goes without saying that, in composing such a list, Hulet has considered the overall future value those prospects might be expected to provide either to the Tigers or whatever other organizations to which they might someday belong.

What this brief post concerns isn’t overall future value, at all, but rather such value as the prospects from Hulet’s list might provide were they to play, more or less, a full major-league season in 2014.

Other prospect projections: Arizona / Atlanta / Baltimore / Boston / Chicago AL / Chicago NL / Cincinnati / Cleveland / Colorado / Houston / Kansas City / Los Angeles AL / Miami / Milwaukee / Minnesota / New York AL / New York NL / Oakland / Philadelphia / Pittsburgh / St. Louis / San Diego / San Francisco / Seattle / Tampa Bay / Texas / Toronto.

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This began with an observation: Since 2008 — covering the bulk of the reliable PITCHf/x era — Miguel Cabrera has swung at just under 47% of pitches with the bases empty, and just over 53% of pitches with a runner or runners on. Now, in that span, 130 different players have faced at least 10,000 pitches. Out of all of them, Cabrera has the biggest positive difference in swing rate. As it happens, Derek Jeter has the biggest negative difference in swing rate, but maybe that’s a different article. Cabrera has swung more with men on; and at bats with men on are more important at bats.

I wanted to dig deeper.

The next step was to break things down by year, to see if there might be a developing trend or a steady pattern. As is often the case, I have to express my gratitude for the existence of Baseball Savant. This table suggests one thing:

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For me, one of the most memorable pitches of the past few seasons is the fastball that Sergio Romo threw by Miguel Cabrera to clinch the 2012 World Series. On its own merits, Romo’s fastball isn’t particularly good, and for that reason, everybody watching figured Romo would throw a slider. For that reason, Romo threw an effective fastball, and it was the biggest pitch of his life — and it turns out every pitch is connected and one never has to really stand on its own merits. Romo succeeds with his fastball in the way that Tim Wakefield succeeded with his fastball: He uses the pitch to take batters by surprise, because his primary pitch is way better.

Game theory is a complicated concept, but pitch mixes make it simpler to grasp. Say you have a pitcher with an unbelievable changeup. Even though the changeup is his best pitch, it wouldn’t make sense to throw it 100% of the time, because a key component is surprise. Therefore there exists some optimum frequency with which the pitcher would throw something else, even if “something else” is something a lot worse. Because of the changeup, in theory, it wouldn’t look a lot worse in context. A hitter should never be able to know what’s coming, unless the pitcher is Mariano Rivera, who now is retired.

And this brings us to the current matter of Al Alburquerque, who has a slider. He has a very good slider, and he’s thrown it a whole bunch.

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After having typically appeared in the entirely venerable pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections were released at FanGraphs last year. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the Detroit Tigers. Szymborski can be found at ESPN and on Twitter at @DSzymborski.

Other Projections: Atlanta / Baltimore / Boston / Cleveland / Los Angeles NL / Miami / Minnesota / New York AL / Philadelphia / San Diego / Seattle / St. Louis.

Batters
Each of the four positions within Detroit’s opening-day infield this coming season will very likely be occupied by a different player than on opening day in 2013. Part of the reason for that is because of how Miguel Cabrera returns to first base, a role to which his defensive abilities are more well suited. Another part of the reason is owing to the departures both of Prince Fielder (via trade) and Omar Infante (via free agency) this offseason. Despite the changes, the probable infield contingent for 2014 (as depicted in the depth-chart image below) ought to rival, in terms of wins, any of those belonging to the last three iterations of the Detoit Tigers, each of which has qualified for the playoffs.

In a recent piece here, Jeff Sullivan explored possible destinations for free-agent outfielder Nelson Cruz. Detroit he classified as a “stretch” — making it actually one of the more likely clubs, relatively speaking, to sign Cruz. So far as ZiPS is concerned, corner outfield and designated hitter are the only positions at which Detroit is likely to receive below-average production.

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To be honest, I really don’t like to speculate on offseasons. Especially offseasons of previously aggressive teams, with so many quality players remaining on the market. I just recently heard about a significant trade that came within a hair of happening between two hopeful contenders, and no one ever caught wind of it as a rumor. There’s a whole lot that goes on as an industry secret, so I really don’t know what teams are up to. But, forced to speculate, I’d say the Tigers seem just about finished. I don’t think that’s a team that’s going to make another splash, and the roster looks more or less like a finished product.

And so, for the Tigers, it’s been an interesting and uncharacteristic sort of offseason. The Tigers, unquestionably, are in position to contend, and to contend for the World Series. Teams like that, you usually see add players and add payroll. But for Detroit it was more an offseason of acting on fiscal responsibility. The biggest name involved in their offseason is Prince Fielder, and he was sent away. They waved goodbye to a pair of quality free-agent middle infielders. They dealt a good starter to D.C. for a young and underwhelming package. Overall, the Tigers saved some money and set themselves up better for the future. It was odd timing, but there’s an angle that might help explain the thought process. At least, it’s an angle that recognizes what the Tigers still are.

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Joaquin Benoit got a two-year, $15.5 mmillion deal to pitch for the Padres this week. The signing didn’t make many waves — after all, Benoit has been a very good reliever the last three years. But three years ago, Benoit’s three-year deal seemed like a head-scratcher. Are there any multi-year reliever signings going on right now that we might look back on as favorably as Benoit’s with the Tigers? Are there any past relievers, future closers still on the market? Who’s the next Joaquin Benoit?

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According to Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet, the Tigers have agreed to terms on a two year contract with Rajai Davis. Davis will give the Tigers a little outfield depth and form a nifty little platoon with Andy Dirks in left field. Davis isn’t a great hitter, but he’s historically done well against left-handers, and should be a nice complement to the underrated Dirks.

The Tigers aren’t really signing Rajai Davis for his bat, though. They’re signing him for his legs, because those are the reasons he’s still employed in Major League Baseball. They’re the reason he’s valuable.

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