WILL THEY OR WON’T THEY?

By:  Holly Horning

The Hot Stove season is starting to get, well, hotter…….. The San Diego Padres just traded for Blake Snell and Yu Darvish.

And the Tigers just signed…. Jose Urena and Dustin Garneau.

Are you surprised? Disappointed? Resigned?

And are you pointing your finger at Al Avila?

Maybe that finger – the index one, of course – should be pointing elsewhere.

To ownership.

Because the simple truth is that any GM can only sign players with the money he is given. There is no GM in the history of the game who didn’t use the entire budget he was given by the owner.

In Al’s case, he is given a payroll ceiling by Chris Ilitch. And he has to decide how to divide it in order to get all the players he needs. In general terms, if he needs to fill multiple holes, the quality and track records of those players is going to be lower than if he only needed a single player.

The first clue about payroll was seen during the Winter Meetings when Avila said that the Tigers would like to sign a new catcher, but that this position wasn’t a priority for them.

Come again?

You have a team that ranked dead last in catching for 2020, a tandem of Jake Rogers and Grayson Greiner going forward, and it’s not a priority?

The Tigers ended up signing Dustin Garneau, age 33-and-a-half, to a minor league contract with an invitation to spring training to try out for the #1 slot.

Translation: Al’s 2021 budget is very tight and won’t cover all the team’s needs. He’s got to get creative, find some of the most inexpensive options out there and hope he hits pay dirt.

So don’t blame him. At least, not yet. Let’s remember he reports to an owner who was infamous for turning down Dave Dombrowski’s reported request for an additional $7 million to sign a closer during one of the Tigers’ most competitive years. A year in which Chris took over the decision-making for his ailing dad.

The year was 2013 and Dave was forced to trade Doug Fister in order to free up payroll so he could sign Joe Nathan.

Seven plus years later, we’re again speculating on when Chris Ilitch will spend. Remember his quote that the team “will spend when the time is right” ? Yet, he never clarified or defined what that meant, leading top Washington politicians to exclaim “genius!” when they heard his comment.

So when will the time be right? Are we ready to condemn ownership or are we being too hasty in our judgement?

To be fair, we live in complicated times. It’s not so black and white anymore when it comes to assessing the Tigers’ timeline for rebuilding. A major hiccup happened last March throughout the world. A lot has changed. Changes that the team cannot control.

The world has been put on hold this year for the most part. And that includes baseball.

But let’s look at the factors that are undoubtedly influencing decisions within the Tigers’ organization. One being the decision to spend.

First, the factors that would support why the Tigers would decide to shell out some cash for free agents.

In a year of uncertainty, the majority of baseball teams are hesitant to spend money given the question marks surrounding the 2021 season and paying fans, which is still being significantly impacted by the pandemic. Many analysts expect a large number of players to sign contracts for much less and surmise that there will be some real bargains out there in a month or two.

Simply by waiting, the Tigers may be able to capitalize on a market that definitely favors the buyers. Things may look awfully good for them with scads of unemployed players just before the start of spring training.

Others are speculating that with the expiration of the Jordan Zimmermann and Prince Fielder contracts, the Tigers’ payroll is now low enough to justify spending some of the savings. (More on that in little while.) It is estimated to be around $70 million for the coming year. One-third of what it was just about 5 years ago.

Potentially, the third reason, and not the most plausible, is that the Front Office may discover that they must go out and sign a free agent because they have a big black hole that needs to be filled and they have no one even remotely close to filling it.

But that’s about it, folks, for reasons supporting the need to sign players who don’t have asterisks by their names for the 2020 season.

Now, let’s turn to the rationale for not taking that checkbook for a spin. Unfortunately, those reasons are more plentiful and dare I say it, more rational. And we’re going to approach the discussion, not as fans, but as businesspeople. As much as we’d like to dream, smart moves have to replace emotion as the driving force.

First, simply because they share the same last name, Christopher is nothing like his dad. Mr. I was ruled by his heart. Chris? By that MBA degree he earned. Besides, have you ever seen him do a news conference, put on a show and make jokes about his checkbook and the $20’s left in his wallet? Of course not. And that is telling.

Let’s also acknowledge that under Mr. I, the Tigers lost money every year (under GM Dave Dombrowski). When his son, Chris, took over, the team started making it, even with all those last-place finishes. It’s not a fluke. It was a deliberate strategy with corresponding actions.

But let’s leave the emotional argument and deal in facts.

Miggy’s contract. If the team does hold to that $70 million payroll estimate, Cabrera will be taking home 46% of it. $30 mill a pop for this year followed by $32 mill for each of the next 2 years. There’s also a risk that the 2 option years may kick in after that. Yikes, there’s a reason why most analysts believe it is MLB’s worst contract.

Covid. Very few people will have the vaccine by spring which will put the start of the season, the number of games and, of course, the fans, in jeopardy. MLB hasn’t even set the schedule in stone officially and another big fight with the Players Association is brewing over how long the season will be. Tony Clark has already fired the first warning shot that players will absolutely, positively not accept a pro-rated salary this year even is the season is shortened.

It’s hard to spend when you can’t even estimate how much revenue you may have coming in the next year.

The CBA. The latest version expires in December 2021 and both sides are already behind with no talks currently taking place. It usually takes a full year or more to negotiate the many big issues and fine points. The last CBA was considered to be a colossal failure for the players in which owners further lined their pockets and the financial gap between owners and players only grew larger.

This negotiation is expected to be particularly nasty. And owners are being realistic that they will have to give up some of their earnings. But analysts are also forecasting, depending upon what happens to the game this year, that there will be a lockout by owners and not a strike.

And finally, there’s the state of the Tigers’ rebuild or “rebuild” if you prefer. It’s been going on since the end of 2015, 2016 or 2017 depending upon whom you ask. The team has yet to have a top prospect earn a permanent position on the field. There are worrisome holes at catcher, first base and left field. Second base, SS and third base have turned into a Rubik’s Cube adventure. And the other 2 outfield positions have some fairly big question marks attached to them.

We won’t even get into the starting rotation or bullpen.

Does this seem like the Tigers are now in a position to spend? Isn’t your money better spent when your team has started to contend and you need to fill in 1 or 2 spots?

Should any team be spending on solid proven talent when they’ve been routinely finishing regularly in last place? Wouldn’t it be a waste of money? Realistically, there are few who would disagree with Chris Ilitch right now about “spending when the time is right.”

I believe most of us can agree that the Tigers shouldn’t be collecting difference-makers this year. But shouldn’t they do some spending? Shouldn’t they be fielding a legitimate team for 2021? Shouldn’t they be putting players on the field who are better than those from 2020?

Of course, they should. But will they?

Will they use the pandemic as an excuse? Will they talk about how much money they lost in 2020 to explain away their few cautious and inexpensive signings?

Next week, we’ll continue this discussion using an in-depth exploration into the Tigers’ 2020 financials by a national writer. You may be surprised by what you learn.

Or not.