Curtis Granderson Placed on Waivers By New York Mets, Detroit Tigers Should Claim

Jun 8, 2014; San Francisco, CA, USA; New York Mets outfielder Curtis Granderson (3) rounds third base after hitting a home run against the San Francisco Giants in the first inning at AT&T Park. Mandatory Credit: Cary Edmondson-USA TODAY Sports

It’s August so just about every player on every team will be placed on revocable waivers — because why not? — most of these players are uninteresting to most teams (the interesting ones get pulled back when claimed) but a name of potential note to the Detroit Tigers — and Tigers fans — arose today. Via MLB Trade Rumors:

"The Mets have placed Curtis Granderson on revocable waivers, according to ESPN’s Jayson Stark (via ESPN New York colleague Adam Rubin). Granderson, 33, is hitting .224/.330/.392 with 15 homers and eight steals in the first year of a four-year, $60MM pact inked with the Mets. He’s owed $3.69MM through season’s end plus another $47MM from 2015-17, making for a total of $50.69MM remaining on his deal"

Granderson, of course, was a fan favorite during his previous tenure* as a member of the Tigers. His name is bigger than his actual talent level at this stage of the game — and he’s owed a ton of money over the next few years — but the Tigers could use a center fielder for the stretch run and Curtis Jr. could serve as a useful fill-in.

*Fun fact: Austin Jackson (670) only played four fewer games as a member of the Tigers than did Granderson (674).

According to Steamer’s rest-of-season projections, Granderson (0.6 RoS WAR) is expected to produce 0.5 wins more than Davis (0.1 RoS WAR) down the stretch. A half of a win doesn’t seem like a lot, but it’s probably more value than the team added in the David Price trade.

Paying Granderson a total of $47 million for 2015-2017 wouldn’t be fun (they’d be buying wins at nearly $13 million apiece), but the Tigers have shown that they’re in-it-to-win-it now, and he represents an improvement over the current crop of outfielders.

Of course, the Mets would have to cooperate in all of this as well. They might not be willing to let Granderson walk away without getting any sort of player back so a deal might be unreachable (the Tigers wouldn’t want to eat all of the money and give up any sort of player of note), but this is at least an avenue Dave Dombrowski should seriously consider.

What say you? Would you like to see Granderson back in the Olde English D?