Detroit Tigers: Matthew Boyd wins Tiger of the Year award

Matthew Boyd was named ‘Tiger of the Year’ by the Baseball Writers Association of America yesterday after his performance with the Detroit Tigers in 2019.

2019 was a season to forget for most of the Detroit Tigers. Matthew Boyd, on the other hand, had the best season of his career. Yesterday, he was named the ‘Tiger of the Year‘ by Detroit’s chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America.

The 28-year-old left-handed pitcher pitched 185.1 innings over 32 starts and finished the season with a 4.56 ERA and a 9-12 record. His most impressive statistic was the number of strikeouts he recorded. He averaged 11.6 strikeouts per nine innings and had 238 on the season.

Boyd’s stats don’t really reflect how great of a season he had. This is partially due to how poorly he performed at the end of the year. Boyd also had some issues keeping the ball in the park, which was a more common issue in 2019, where home runs were hit with great regularity. Despite these things, he was easily the best performer on a rebuilding team.

The big question surrounding Boyd is whether he will remain a Tiger. There were plenty of rumors about him before the 2019 trade deadline, but Al Avila wasn’t willing to make any trades then. With this being the case, Boyd didn’t do himself any favors in the second half of the 2019 season, and his trade value has probably diminished. Avila hasn’t disclosed whether he plans to deal Boyd this offseason, or at all.

Boyd has made it clear that he hopes to remain a Tiger, but baseball is ultimately a business and it is unclear whether Detroit plans to make him an integral part of their rebuild. As it stands, he is the Tiger of the Year from the 2019 season and will continue to be a Tiger for the time being.