What the Detroit Tigers’ 2022 roster looks like entering ’20-21 offseason

The Detroit Tigers’ 2022 roster is going to have some holes.

Today we’re going to take a far-too-early look at the Detroit Tigers‘ 2022 roster.

Looking to the future might seem a bit like a fool’s errand — and it is. You can plug in names and you’re going to be wrong. That’s expected.

But it’s also a bit useful, because trying to build your team’s roster one year at a time is not necessarily the most efficient or ideal way of tackling things either.

A player available this year might be perfect for your team two years down the line, while the players available a year later might be completely ill-fitted for the job.

That’s why I think it’s a bit silly when people think it’s too early to spend money without thinking about the big picture and how the pieces fit together over the years.

With all that in mind, I thought I’d try to put together a glance at the Tigers’ roster two seasons from now so we can start to think about what players available now might go a long way to making the team a contender in the future.

I’m going to use two of my favorite sources for this: Cot’s Contracts (via Baseball Prospectus) and Roster Resource (via Fangraphs). Spotrac is also valuable to look at for this exercise.

I am going to put together the roster based on players already in the organization. We will assume the Tigers do the bare minimum this offseason, generally signing rebuilding projects to one-year deals to fill out their 2021 roster.

We will also try to make reasonable assumptions about which prospects will rise and perform at the major league level, and which ones are just keeping the position warm because somebody has to.

Projected Detroit Tigers 2022 rotation

SP — Casey Mize (RHP)

SP — Matt Manning (RHP)

SP — Tarik Skubal (LHP)

SP — Spencer Turnbull (RHP)

SP — ???

It does not take a big leap to say that the potential to have a stable of young, high-quality starting pitchers is where the Tigers hang their most hopes.

We all witnessed the shortened 2020 season, of course. We know they didn’t exactly hit the mound to a chorus of oohs and ahhs. In fact, even with the exciting young starters getting plenty of time, the Tigers have one of the worst rotation ERAs in the majors.

In this case, stuff should win out. We all just have to acknowledge (hope) that the strangeness of the preparation time for 2020 and the shortness of the season means we should take the numbers with a grain of salt.

That said, not every prospect is going to stick around, and the likelihood of either Matt Boyd and Michael Fulmer anchoring 2022 seems unlikely. It seems far more likely that they’ll bounce back enough to become tradeable, or they won’t and that will make them strong non-tender candidates rather than paying them.

If neither of those things happens, I’d give the edge to Fulmer remaining with the team.

For now, let’s just assume at least one veteran signing occurs. They could probably use another left-handed starter.

Projected Detroit Tigers 2022 bullpen

RP –Beau Burrows (RHP)

RP — Jose Cisnero (RHP)

RP — Buck Farmer (RHP)

RP — Alex Faedo (RHP)

RP — Bryan Garcia (RHP)

RP — Joe Jimenez (RHP)

RP — Gregory Soto (LHP)

RP — Joey Wentz (LHP)

This actually continues the trend of the starting pitching relatively well.

The Tigers just have a lot of quality arms in the system. They have the potential to put together a pretty nice bullpen, mixing some quality and experience and a couple of interesting southpaws, too.

As we said earlier, this is just an exercise in roster-building. Someone on this list is going to progress, and one or two players might take a step back. That’s just the way it works. And frankly, that would be for the best, wouldn’t it?

In reality, maybe two, three, four of these players start the year in the minors due to some veteran signings.

A few quick notes on the list:

Joey Wentz is rather on the edge, but we’ve included him here because he’s a prospect of a little acclaim in the system and a left-hander, so it works well for the exercise of knowing what the Tigers might have.

Alex Faedo is a player who a lot had penciled into the rotation from the day he was drafted, but he hasn’t quite progressed and you’re going to need some good arms in the rotation, too. Maybe he finds his natural fit there.

Projected Detroit Tigers’ 2022 bench

C — Random veteran

INF — Isaac Paredes

Util  — Niko Goodrum

OF — Daz Cameron

There’s really no one in the system worth considering as a backup catcher. In reality, if Rogers is the starter they’ll have to find one. And if Rogers is the backup it’s because they found a starter.

Because we could find no home for Paredes in the starting lineup and he’s shown at least a little ability to move around the diamond so far in his minor league career, we’ve got him penciled in coming off the bench here.

The same can be said of Niko Goodrum, who’ll be in his second year of arbitration. Infield, outfield, you name it. Coming off the bench doesn’t mean he lacks value. Winning teams need players like Goodrum to really be the glue that can hold things together.

Cameron is another of those prospects who has sort of fizzled with time. His OPS across two seasons in Triple-A is a rather disheartening .691. His time in Detroit wasn’t really all that much better. So this is another roster spot that you can kind of project going to someone getting bumped out of the current starting lineup or to a crafty veteran.

Drawing conclusions from the Detroit Tigers 2022 roster exercise

The roster looks more fun, compared to what we’ve seen as fans lately. But it doesn’t look like a team that is going to have the strongest claim to bringing home the division title, either.

There’s been an idea among some people that the Tigers aren’t going to compete in 2021 and their top prospects are still another year out, so there’s really no reason to try too hard.

After all, losing just means another nice draft spot. Their abysmal 2020 season netted them the No. 3 overall pick in next year’s draft. That’s just another chance to get a highly regarded prospect to plug into the system and have ready to go down the line.

The problem with this line of thinking is that a team is not going to be able to go out and fill all of its spots all at once.

Taking a look at the upcoming roster, reason for excitement (like the young rotation, Torkelson, Greene) has to be offset by the lack of likely star players up the middle.

And those middle positions (catcher, second base, shortstop, center field) really are key.

It’s clear the Tigers aren’t going to have to carry a lot of money in payroll. They’re stuck with Cabrera’s $32 million, sure. But without any key signings, their next most expensive player would be Boyd, in his final year of arbitration, at maybe $8 million.

It’s hard to find anyone who will cost more than $4 million for the year, and much of the roster will be filled at around the league minimum.

So they have the money. They have the need. Now is the time to begin spending.