Detroit Tigers Links: V-Mart’s future, Tigers weak farm system & Ausmus getting to know his team

Credit: Ed Szczepanski-USA TODAY Sports

With everyone’s minds on whether or not the Tigers will/should sign Max Scherzer to a long-term deal and how much will it cost to keep Miguel Cabrera past 2015, everyone seems to forget that V-Mart’s deal is almost up.

Victor Martinez on Tigers: ‘We’ll see’ – ESPN

"“I want to stay here, yes,” Martinez told reporters at the team’s TigerFest. “But they have a lot going on. They have Scherzer; they have Miggy.” “I want to take this opportunity to thank the Tigers’ organization and all the fans, because when I had choices of where to go when I was a free agent, I came here because I felt it was the best chance to win,” Martinez told reporters. “I haven’t been wrong about that. We’ve won the division, have gone to the World Series, but we still have some work to do. We’ll see what happens. This is a great organization that does what it needs to win.” Martinez, who will make $12 million in the final year of his four-year deal, hit .301 with 14 home runs and 83 RBIs in just 80 games last season. He missed the entire 2012 season after tearing the ACL in his left knee during preseason conditioning. He’ll get plenty of opportunity to produce for the Tigers this season as he’ll likely hit cleanup behind Cabrera with Prince Fielder having gone to the Texas Rangers."

Yikes, the thought of losing Victor’s bat is more frightening than losing Prince.

Detroit Tigers’ farm system ranked third-worst in MLB – James Jahnke, Detroit Free Press

"The club’s farm system today was ranked the third-worst in baseball by espn.com’s Keith Law, ahead of only the Los Angeles Angels and the Milwaukee Brewers. The Houston Astros were No. 1. “This system boils down to third baseman Nick Castellanos and a lot of power arms who seem like probable relievers, as well as some slick defensive middle infielders, any of whom could establish himself as a valuable asset with a year of offensive production,” Law wrote. “I’d like the system more had the Doug Fister trade yielded a top-50 prospect, as you’d expect, given Fister’s performance the past two years.”"

This is not news to hardcore fans/readers of Motor City Bengals. This is why, while unpopular, the Doug Fister trade makes some sense. If the young core of Robbie Ray, Jose Iglesias and Casty are the players we think, then the Tigers won’t have as many holes to fill on the big league level in the coming years (hopefully).

New Detroit Tigers manager Brad Ausmus starts crash course on players entering camp – George Sipple, Free Press

"“I’ve talked to a lot of the players at this point,” Ausmus said. “The TigerFest and caravan allow me to do that.” Ausmus said he got feedback from veterans, coaches like Gene Lamont and Jeff Jones, as well as former manager Jim Leyland. He wanted to know about the locker room he was inheriting. “Every single one of them said the same thing, ‘It’s great, great group of guys,’ ” Ausmus said. “I’ve yet to hear a bad thing. So, if it goes bad, it’s my fault.”"

One of the things I am most interested to see with Brad Ausmus is how his players react to him when he makes a controversial decision (like removing Justin Verlander when he thinks he can still go another inning). Leyland always had that “father figure” thing where players never got visually upset with him. The Tigers are a bunch of professionals so I don’t see it happening, but a club with weaker character might not take kindly to being bossed around by a guy only a few years older than them.