Tampa — He’s always been the one pillar standing.
When Placido Polanco, Carlos Guillen, Magglio Ordonez and Jhonny Peralta left, Miguel Cabrera was still there, giving the Tigers a face and a foundation.
When Rick Porcello and Max Scherzer left, when David Price, Anibal Sanchez, Prince Fielder, Ian Kinsler, Justin Upton and Torii Hunter all came and went, Cabrera was still in the center of that clubhouse, keeping things together as best he could.
Finally, when Victor Martinez, J.D. Martinez and Justin Verlander departed, Cabrera stood alone, the last vestige of the Tigers’ 10-year run of Central Division dominance.
And now he’s leaving.
At age 40, after winning a Triple Crown, two MVP awards, four batting titles, 12 All-Star appearances, after becoming one of just three players in the history of the game to accumulate at least 500 homers, 3,000 hits and 600 doubles, after helping the Tigers to four division championships, one American League pennant and one World Series appearance, Miguel Cabrera is taking his last lap around the bases.
As he promised several years ago and confirmed this winter, he will play out his contract with the Tigers and retire after this season.
Now what?
“We need to learn as much from Miggy as we can while we have him as an active player,” Tigers manager AJ Hinch said. “We also need Miggy to be good. Our best team needs Miggy to perform and produce and do whatever is asked of him. And he’s willing to do that.
“I am very sensitive to Miguel being portrayed as anything other than a regular player that we’re trying to use in the right way. We need to give him the right rest days and the right matchups and let him be a part of a winning team.”
What neither Cabrera nor Hinch wants is for this to be a ceremonial season. But, it may be unavoidable. He’s going to be honored and his career celebrated everywhere he goes — there’s nothing to be done about that. He’s earned that.
Whether he wants it or not.
“I look forward to enjoying the season and trying to help these young guys through the season and help our team win more games,” Cabrera said at the beginning of camp, the only time he’s addressed his final season. “That’s my focus. I don’t want to be a distraction. I don’t want any videos or any of that stuff. I don’t want the attention. I want to be just hiding out and doing my job.”
If this were a movie, Cabrera would have a resurgent season, hit 24 home runs with 68 RBI, help his team get back to the playoffs and then ride off into the sunset. Problem is, Albert Pujols wrote that movie last year in St. Louis, and it’s probably too soon for a sequel.
The final scene of Cabrera’s movie is more of a mystery. As Hinch has said, he won’t be the regular designated hitter. That is as much a strategy as it is for health reasons. They hope to manage the chronic pain in Cabrera’s right knee well enough, to give him enough rest, to not only get him through the entire season but to keep him in favorable matchups.
He’s likely to get most of his at-bats against left-handed pitching, playing maybe once a series, or two or three times a week.
“It’s hard to think about retiring after the season,” he said. “I want to go out there and be me and have fun. If they give me a chance to play, I’m going to play. I don’t know what my role is going to be this year. I am open to do anything.
“Hopefully I can hit and be in the lineup.”
Passing the torch
Riley Greene was sitting in front of his locker in Lakeland a couple of weeks ago. He was asked if he remembered the first day he met Cabrera. It was a warm summer day in 2019. Greene had just been drafted by the Tigers, the fifth overall pick in the June draft, and he was invited to take a round of batting practice at Comerica Park.
“Of course, I remember,” Greene said.
He was smacking balls up onto the Pepsi Porch, well beyond the right-field wall, as Cabrera came up the steps to watch.
“I remember him just screaming at me, saying, ‘Put him in the big leagues,’” Greene said, smiling. “I was thinking to myself, ‘I’m only 18 years old. And it’s BP.’ But then, too, I would have been OK with it, 100 percent.
“But, just having him there and watching, it was awesome.”
Greene joined Cabrera in Detroit last season, after sitting out of the first couple of months because of a broken bone in his foot.
“I remember when I first got called up and I was getting some pitches that were called strikes that I thought were balls,” Greene said. “Miggy definitely thought they were balls and he was chirping from the dugout: ‘Those are balls! They’re balls!’ It was cool to know he had your back, even as a rookie, a guy who just got called up.
“It didn’t matter who you were; Miggy’s got your back.”
Now, it’s time for Greene and the rest of the team to have Cabrera’s back.
The 2023 baseball season in Detroit marks a true transition. Not only does the face of the franchise shift from Cabrera to Greene and Spencer Torkelson, both supremely talented former first-round picks who are on the verge of breakout seasons.
But just as significant, the leadership has shifted from the traditional methods of former president and general manager Al Avila to the new-school, data- and tech-driven methods of 35-year-old, first-year president of baseball operations Scott Harris.
“It’s how he sees everything,” Tigers starting pitcher Matthew Boyd said. “He is completely all-in on finding wins in the margins. That’s been a common theme here. Let’s maximize every rep. Let’s make the most out of every drill. Let’s have intention with everything we do.
“Some of this may sound mundane or useless. But, it’s about finding wins in the margins … It’s about each one of us getting incrementally better. You get a whole locker room of guys getting incrementally better every day, who knows what the results will be.”
Harris calls it a culture of development. It’s what he helped create in San Francisco. He’s revamped the medical and training facilities and staffs, addressing the club’s unusually high injury rate last season. He’s bolstered the player-development department with better technology and equipment, as well as staffing.
The big-league coaching staff now has three hitting coaches and three pitching coaches — one of which is a biometrics expert, Robin Lund.
“It’s not ever just about talent,” catcher Eric Haase said. “Talent is the floor in the big leagues. But, it’s like having that edge, knowing that guys belong here. Guys belong on that field, and there is no higher level. There are guys who really excel at this level and there are guys who don’t. We’re ultimately trying to be the ones who do.”
And, Haase said, this culture of development is helping to create that edge.
“The message was, ‘Hey, this is what you do well. Find places where you can do this,’” Haase said. “You feel like, not that you have the freedom, but like, I know I do this well, so here are some areas where I can do it. Then, those things come up in a game and it’s like, ‘Yeah, this is what I do well.’”
He used his receiving as an example.
“I knew it wasn’t great,” Haase said. “We made a bit of a change (in where he set up, moving closer to the plate) and it’s been drastically changed this spring. I love that. I seek that out, too. It is very, very clear this year where, in the past, it was tough to get to.
“It’s like, ‘Hey, if you do this well, the team gets better.’ So many things in the past got lost in translation.”
It was the technology, the overhead cameras, that showed Haase where the more successful catchers set up behind the plate. And it was the league-wide data that showed him how the framing metrics and blocking stats improved by being closer to the plate.
“I had been setting up too far back because I was emphasizing different things (blocking),” he said. “Now, it’s more receive-first. And my blocking has gotten better, too. It’s something I’ve always been able to do, but now it’s clear.
“Talent is not what keeps these guys out of the big leagues. It’s consistently doing what they know they can be good at.”
Just one example of finding wins in the margins.
Not a research project
So, what are we looking at here? How many wins might the Tigers find in the margins in 2023? The actuarial prognosticators — Baseball Reference, FanGraphs, Baseball Prospectus and others — don’t see too many more wins in those margins than the 66 the Tigers earned last season.
Those directly involved, as you would expect, strongly dispute those predictions.
“Twenty steps forward — that’s the way I see it in this clubhouse,” Tigers Opening Day starter Eduardo Rodriguez said. “This is my second year. Javy Báez’s too. We kind of got into the division now, the league, our teammates, the organization. All the new guys we saw last year as rookies, they’re coming into their second season, and they learned from last year.
“I would say a lot of good things are coming from all the bad things that happened last year. I see in their faces, they’re ready for the season.”
The Tigers had an almost historically impotent offense last season and Harris did not sign a single free-agent position player this winter. Instead, he has assembled a group of mostly young versatile position players. Some, like Greene and Torkelson, have incredibly high upsides. Others, like newcomers Nick Maton, Matt Vierling and Zach McKinstry, have specific areas of strength that can be exploited with certain matchups.
And, as Rodriguez said, there are veterans like Báez, Jonathan Schoop and Austin Meadows who are strong bounce-back candidates.
“I feel like everyone in the clubhouse is crucial to what we’re trying to do and what we’re trying to build,” Greene said. “It’s going to take every single guy — pitchers, catchers, position players. It’s going to take everyone to get us where we want to go.
“There’s a saying that all the coaches are hammering into us every day: ‘Get 1% better every day.’ Over the course of a year, that’s a lot.”
Instead of locking in five or six everyday players, the Tigers are going to mix and match and try to create favorable matchups at five or six positions. Greene in center field, Torkelson at first and Báez at shortstop might be the lone one-position players.
“It’s not difficult or more difficult,” Hinch said. “It’s just maximizing the roster that you have and trying to put the players in position to be successful. Which is the same, whether you have six or eight All-Stars, like we had at my previous stop (Houston), or whether it’s trying to maximize the talents of players at several different positions.”
Hinch bristles at the notion that this is somehow new territory for him as a manager. He will point you to his 2015 Astros team, a collection of young, not-yet-All Stars, aging veterans and spare parts that he coaxed 86 wins out of.
“Oftentimes, especially with me, the probable assumption is that every year is an easy year when you manage the caliber of teams that I ended up with,” he said. “That has not been my entire managerial career. The goal for the players is to understand why we do what we do, what we’re doing with them and how they can maximize our wins.
“The communication is the same across all types of teams.”
Hinch has shown himself very adept at creating and exploiting matchup advantages — either offensively or with his pitching decisions.
“It’s fun when the players play well,” he said. “It’s a great challenge. But, this isn’t a research project. It’s about trying to win that day’s game.”
Fragile rotation, untested bullpen
FRAGILE ROTATION, UNTESTED BULLPEN
As for the pitching side of the equation, well, can it be anything but fragile?
On paper, the rotation looks strong. Rodriguez, who pitched for Team Venezuela in the World Baseball Classic and had a dominant spring, is at the top of his game. And Spencer Turnbull is back, and seemingly as good as ever, after missing 19 months recovering from Tommy John surgery — a huge boost.
Harris brought back the lefty Boyd ($10 million) and signed free-agent right-hander Michael Lorenzen ($8.5 million). Lorenzen, though, will start the season on the injured list after hurting his groin late in camp.
A pair of 25-year-olds will round out the rotation — righty Matt Manning and lefty Joey Wentz.
The concern here is durability. None of those starters pitched a full season last year. The Tigers will be wary of their workloads. Innings will be limited, especially early in the season.
To that end, the bullpen will feature a group of long-inning relievers who will supplement the starters — lefty Tyler Alexander, Rule 5 right-hander Mason Englert and right-handers Garrett Hill and Beau Brieske are expected to fill those roles.
The rotation could get a boost toward the middle of the season, too. Lefty Tarik Skubal is working his way back from flexor tendon surgery.
The bullpen, one of the few undeniable strengths of the team last season, is perhaps the biggest question mark entering this season. Gone are four of the team’s top leverage relievers — Gregory Soto, Joe Jimenez, Andrew Chafin and Michael Fulmer.
Hinch isn’t likely to name a closer any time soon. The late-inning work, at least initially, will go to right-handers Alex Lange, Jose Cisnero, Jason Foley and, in certain situations, left-hander Chasen Shreve.
The last three spots in the bullpen could end up being a revolving door.
“There’s a lot of different contingencies,” Hinch said, as he and Harris deliberated on those final bullpen spots. “Some of it centers around roles, and some of it centers around how do we win the first two series (at Tampa and Houston) before we get home.
“How does it match up so that we can get off to a better start than we have in my two years here.”
What Miggy wants
There’s already a blank spot on the bricks at Comerica Park where Cabrera’s No. 24 will be memorialized for future generations. Induction into the Hall of Fame will undoubtedly come in five years, the first time he’s on the ballot.
There’s already a blank spot on the bricks at Comerica Park where Cabrera’s No. 24 will be memorialized for all-time. Induction into the Hall of Fame will undoubtedly come in five years, the first time he’s on the ballot.
His place, his prominent place, in Tigers history and in the game’s history is secure. So much greatness. So many memories. So little time left to savor it.
“You’ve got to enjoy these moments,” Cabrera said. “I think we are blessed because we have so many. I’m grateful for them, and I am going to enjoy every one of them.”
In his first meeting with the team before the first full-squad workout this spring, Hinch made sure his players understood the gravity of this season — for Cabrera, for the Tigers organization and for baseball.
Cherish these days.
“Hopefully, it’s a healthy season where he contributes and we build a winner,” Hinch said. “That’s the whole goal for him. I told our team that at the beginning of camp: ‘If you want to honor him, play better and win. That’s what Miggy wants.’”
Twitter: @cmccosky