4 Detroit Tigers who are key to a playoff berth in 2022

If the Detroit Tigers have an opportunity for the post-season, these are the four players who will need to help them pave the way.

If you look across the major sports publications online and look at the MLB off-season grades, you will see the Detroit Tigers have fared pretty well. ESPN’s David Schoenfield ($) gave them a “B+.” The only problem he had was the same issue that contributor Jon Erikka, and many other Tigers fans have said and that is, they only went so far and were still $50 million below past payrolls.

That is a fair critique based on the roster construction, but we will circle back to that later. The Sporting News gave them also a “B+” based on lineup still not being “great” and said that Casey Mize had a “decent” first season as a starter. Here are the rest of the grades and a quote from their predictions.

CBS Sports: B  “PECOTA has the Tigers projected to finish last in the AL Central, so it’s possible we’re being too kind when we give the Tigers a B.”

Jim Bowden of the Athletic ($): A  “The smartest decision the Tigers made this offseason was to let their top two prospects, center fielder Riley Greene and first baseman Spencer Torkelson, try to make the big-league team out of spring training.”

The reason I mentioned the grades in the off-season, even our own we posted last week, are favorable to the Tigers. But we all know that off-season grades are meaningless. Detroit received a “N/A” from CBS Sports last season. With unlikely contributions from Rule 5 pickup Akil Baddoo, the signing of Wily Peralta, and bullpen arms like Kyle Funkhouser, Jose Cisnero and Gregory Soto becoming reliable arms when their name was called, Detroit exceeded everyone’s expectations.

Both A.J. Hinch and Al Avila have said they made moves to put the team into playoff positioning. So let’s look at the four players who are going to be key in making this happen in 2022.

Detroit Tigers shortstop Javier Báez

If there is one item to note about the Detroit Tigers off-season moves were some comments that came out anonymously in a recent article in Baseball America ($) which had this line about the signing of Javier Baez and the lineup.

“I don’t love the Javy Baez signing,” an NL front office official said. “He’s not a guy you build around, and now for them, he is. People can say what they want. He’s polarizing. Is he really talented? Yeah, of course. We all know that. But do you really want him hitting in a big spot? I just don’t see him as that guy . . .

“It’s not a good lineup, and then you add a super swinger, I don’t know. It could be ugly.”

The strikeout numbers do not lie about Baez nor about the Tigers. Baez led the league in strikeouts with 184 with a walk rate about 5.1%. Only two players were above 10% for the Tigers in walk rate last season. Candelario (10.4%) and Grossman (14.6%) with Akil Baddoo just under 10% at 9.8%.

In the first half of the season, Baez struck out around a 36% clip. For the second half, the rate dropped around 29% between his last 47 plate appearances with the Cubs and 184 with the Mets to finish out the season.

It wasn’t until June 25th, until the end of the season, that Baez hit. He put up a slash line of .298/.364/.516 with an OPS of .879 over his last 286 plate appearances. The first half of his 2019 season lined up rather similar, with a few more home runs as he went .289/.325/.556 with .881 OPS with 22 home runs and 23 doubles over 376 plate appearances.

The Tigers are already getting a huge upgrade with his glove. Last season, the Tigers were near the bottom in defensive runs saved (DRS) at shortstop at -15. Baez with the Cubs finished at 4 before he went to the Mets and primarily played second. With New York, he produced one of the worst swings last season.

The two factors that will help Baez is making more chase contact. In 2019, his chase contact was at 50% and last season, it was the lowest of his career outside of his rookie season at 46.7%.

As Chris Brown pointed out when Detroit signed him, it isn’t pretty, but even a small increase in contact rate and swinging strike rate makes a difference. Baez recently said he is working on less movement in his swing and with the Tigers hitting coach Scott Coolbaugh, who has helped several players with their swing mechanics, the little increases for Baez will pay off for the Tigers.

Detroit Tigers third baseman Jeimer Candelario

Jeimer Candelario lead the team in WAR last season with 3.8 last season and lead all of baseball with 42 doubles. That total is 31st among Detroit Tigers history and 20th highest by an infielder.

What was more impressive was the fact he was among the top 30 players in all of baseball in Swing/Take, a stat that determines the value of every pitch based on its outcome in the four attack regions. The heart, shadow, chase and waste. He had 29 on the season.

What does that mean? His patience at the plate and making contact at chase pitches were above league average. Even pitches in the heart of the zone, he connected at a high clip.

The reason I put Candelario on this list is that if he can continue to grow as a player this season and turn the doubles into home runs, that could put him into All-Star consideration and raise his profile in MLB. There are a lot of Tigers fans who like Candelario because not only he is a good player but a good teammate as well.

His average exit velocity was under 90 last season, but it does not paint the picture of Jeimer in terms of the doubles he hit. He averaged 96.1 exit velocity on his doubles, with 3 of those doubles were over 400 feet at Comerica Park.

When you look at the spray chart, you can see those could put Candelario over 20 home runs last season. That is a minor flaw, but hitting more homers could put Jeimer into another category among infielders in the American League. His defense last season had a minor setback (-9.2 in UZR/150) compared to the 2019 season (6.3)

He is often overlooked, but with a few more home runs this season, those days may be over.

Detroit Tigers Starting Pitcher Casey Mize

There are two ways to look at the season that Casey Mize had in 2021. The first way is his bWAR of 3.3, throwing 150 innings and making 30 starts which led all Detroit Tigers starters last season. Another way to look at his performance last season is his strikeout numbers, which was 7.06 per 9 innings and having a FIP of 4.71.

Looking his numbers from last season, if there was one pitch that helped when his splitter was not working was his slider was able to generate a whiff% of 28% and was his go to put away pitch and produced an impressive run value of -10. It added a different element to his game last season.

The splitter generated just a whiff% of 21% last season. Another item to note is throwing the splitter more in 2021 compared to 2020, he generated a run value of -3.

But one pitch that drew my interest is his curve, which is more like a knuckle curve. Batters hit just .129 against it and was able to generate a 26.4% whiff rate on it. He only threw it just 6% of the time, but it provided a different element to his pitches, since he throws a four-seamer, splitter, and a sinker. In the grand scheme of things, it adds up to three different types of fastballs.

Similar to Tarik Skubal, you want to see the amount of home runs given up to be reduced in order for the Tigers to have a chance. Add in pitching better against his division opponents. He went 2-6 against the Twins, Royals and White Sox last season, the two wins came against Kansas City.

By taking his strikeout game to the next level, Mize will help Detroit stay in contention.