Tigers Off to a Solid Start

Today, Dave Dombrowski traded for Gerald Laird, signed Adam Everett and restored my faith in his team construction skills. After spending last offseason building the world’s greatest slow-pitch softball team, Dombrowski’s budget was cut, forcing him to go back to basics and build his team the right way. He addressed two needs with players who are perfect fits and committed only $4 million to next year’s payroll. He has plugged two of the holes in the Tigers’ ship, surprisingly without making any major long-term commitments. The Laird trade is a perfect example. Dombrowski gave up 2 pitching prospects for a catching sure thing. Laird may not be an all-star, but going into the season, the Tigers know exactly what they are going to get from him. There’s always risk in a trade, I would be lying if I wrote that I wasn’t afraid that trading Guillermo Moscoso might come back to bite the Tigers, but there is a damn good chance that neither Moscoso, nor 17-year-old Carlos Melo will amount to anything useful in the Majors. Laird is exactly the kind of player that the Tigers lacked last season. He plays solid defense, hits the ball to the gaps, and doesn’t make stupid mistakes. I’m not going to say that he is a better player than Pudge Rodriguez, but he is definitely a better fit for this Detroit team. He knows his role and he will perform admirably in it. Ditto for Adam Everett. He will be a perfect stopgap for the next year until Cale Iorg is ready to take over. Everett has a bit of a checkered injury history, but when healthy, he is an elite defensive shortstop. Sure, he can’t hit is way out of a paper bag, but neither could Edgar Renteria. Personally, I would like to see when Ramon Santiago could do with 500 at-bats worth of playing time at shortstop, but I understand his value as a speed/defense guy coming off of the Tigers’ bench. Overall, these moves are a nice start to the offseason for Detroit. Dombrowski has already said that he would like to add some bullpen depth and I would like to see him go after another starting pitcher as well. The 2009 season is a marathon, not a sprint, and although I can’t say that the Tigers are ahead of the pack, at least they haven’t stumbled coming out of the gate.