Detroit Tigers: Financial outlook over next few years

Detroit Tigers fans have long seen the team operate with a high payroll. That’s beginning to change, with recent trades creating more financial flexibility. In the future the payroll will continue to shrink.

Detroit Tigers executive vice president of baseball operations and general manager Al Avila inherited a team from his predecessor in Dave Dombrowski that wasn’t exactly cheap from a payroll standpoint.

The Tigers routinely spent with the league’s best in pursuit of an elusive World Series trophy.

Now, with the club in a full-on rebuild, the payroll is coming down.

In-season trades of starting pitcher Justin Verlander, outfielders J.D. Martinez and Justin Upton, closer Justin Wilson and catcher Alex Avila helped get the ball rolling in terms of paring down the team’s financial commitments.

More moves are likely to come this winter as Detroit could conceivably trade a number of other veterans.

Here is a look at how the Detroit Tigers financial outlook will change over the coming seasons.

It obviously doesn’t take into account potential free agent signings this winter or in the future.

All told, Detroit’s payroll will be going down over the next few seasons.

Long-term, this is a definite positive.

The franchise may not return to the spending ways of the last decade, but the Tigers having financial flexibility when the team returns to contention will allow for more room to make additions to bolster the team.