Tigers should be thanking their lucky stars for Guardians' ill-advised trade deadline

The Tigers had a brief respite from the 1-12 slide they endured from July 9-26 when they swept the Diamondbacks at home, but it didn't last long. They dropped two to the Phillies over the weekend and then two to the Twins this week, and nothing has looked right. Key offensive contributors (Riley Greene's slump has been especially worrisome) aren't hitting, trade deadline acquisitions are volatile or downright bad, and the bullpen hasn't gotten any better. If anything, they've gotten worse.

On July 7 and 8, the Tigers held their largest division lead of the season — 14 games over the Guardians. In just a single month, that's been whittled down to six games. It's still the largest first to second place deficit in any division, but if Cleveland already made up over half of the ground between themselves and Detroit, what's stopping them from overcoming the deficit in August and running away in September?

The Guardians' trade deadline strategy — or maybe lack of one — might be the long-term key for the Tigers keeping their hold on the AL Central. Cleveland dealt just two players at the deadline, Shane Bieber to the Blue Jays and Paul Sewald to the Tigers, but they clearly didn't believe enough in their own ability to end up on top this year to add aggressively (or at all).

Guardians' lack of trade deadline moves might be what keeps them at bay as Tigers' lead slips

The Guardians were just three games out of a Wild Card spot on trade deadline day. Through August 6, they're tied with the Rangers at 1.5 games out. Three games wasn't an insurmountable number, especially not with the Yankees slipping they way they've been. Why didn't they buy?!

To be fair, giving up Bieber and Sewald were decent payroll-clearing moves. Bieber hasn't pitched since April 2, 2024, and Sewald was on the 15-day IL before being traded (the Tigers have since moved him to the 60-day). They didn't give up Steven Kwan, which was a huge win, but they didn't supplement at all.

One might argue that the Guardians are doing just fine without new players. Gavin Williams just nearly no-hit the Mets on Wednesday, until Juan Soto broke it up with a one-out solo homer in the bottom of the ninth. Cleveland's won seven out of their last 10.

Tigers fans have to hope that the Guardians' silence at the deadline will come back to haunt them, but also that some of Detroit's acquisitions will actually pay off and some of the pieces that were so instrumental to the Tigers' first-half success will start clicking back into place.