Detroit Tigers: Three players who should not be traded this offseason

Michael Fulmer

There may come a day when the Detroit Tigers trade Michael Fulmer.

He’s only 24, has already racked up a 6.5 fWAR in his first 323.2 innings and isn’t yet eligible for arbitration.

According to Spotrac, the hurler won’t hit free agency until after the 2022 season.

With the Tigers going through a rebuild, the team may not be in a position to contend while Fulmer is still under team control.

In that scenario, it’s plausible to see the team trade him considering his value.

However, by the same controllability token—as it were—Detroit could be back into the thick of things by 2022, if not much, much sooner.

Detroit’s rebuild was painful at first, and may continue to be painful for the next short while.

Head start on the rest of the league

However, the team has a number of top prospects relatively close to the Majors, notably Franklin Perez, Christin Stewart and Beau Burrows.

What’s more, the Tigers may have gotten a head start on a number of other American League teams with worse farm systems who could be rebuilding soon.

Kansas City, a franchise with a significantly worse franchise than Detroit’s, could see a rebuild as early as this winter as much of their World-Series winning core hits the free agent market.

Baltimore will have to navigate a similar situation next offseason with Manny Machado, Adam Jones, Zach Britton and Brad Brach all playing the final years of their contracts.

Elsewhere, Anaheim and Seattle don’t have enviable farm systems.

Meanwhile, the Blue Jays could be stuck in a transition phase from the Jose Bautista era to the next phase of the franchise likely to be headlined by Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette.

Ace

With Fulmer, Detroit has one of the better, young franchise building blocks in the league. It makes sense to keep him.

That being said, if the organization does trade him, now is not the time to do it with the ace currently making his way back from an injury that cost him the tail end of the 2017 season and required offseason surgery.