Baseball Nation - With Prince Fielder Around, Miguel Cabrera Preparing For Third Base

The Offensive Corner Defense Of The Detroit Tigers

2012-08-29T18:00:32Z

This one's a two-parter, in which there's a mea culpa and some concern-trolling, albeit of the well-founded variety. It has to do with the Detroit Tigers and their defense.

The mea culpa first.

Miguel Cabrera isn't that bad at third base

As you might expect, different defensive metrics have different takes. FanGraphs has him down as -6.3 runs in the field this season, which would be the third-worst in the majors among qualified third basemen. According to range runs, he has some of the worst range in the game. But Defensive Runs Saved has him as a totally neutral third baseman. The anecdotal evidence is inconclusive, of course, as he'll make plays like this to make you cautiously optimistic, and then he'll make plays like this, that jibe with your expectations.

But I was expecting a disaster. Like, an emergency meeting called in the front office before April was over. Tarp-related errors. Rosin bags swallowed. I was expecting Cabrera to make the experiment look completely untenable, like Todd Hundley in the outfield or Mike Piazza at first base. Not only was it going to be untenable, it was going to be an obvious failure right away. It was going to combine two generations of defensive stats -- ye olde fielding percentage and advanced metrics -- into one of history's greatest defensive monsters.

Instead? You know, whatever. He's not great. He isn't good. But he's a third baseman. That is, he isn't a DH playing third base in a way that embarrasses third basemen and designated hitters alike. He's … you know, whatever. Which was about the best-case scenario coming into the season. And when it comes to his clankmittery? It's much less of a problem than anyone could have expected.

Miguel Cabrera errors at third base:
2007: 23
2008: 5 (in 14 games)
2012: 10

Errors are kind of like batting average in that you'll lose money trying to bet on them every year, so this might not be indicative of a sure-handed Miggy. But it's encouraging for a team that's building around an idea that it can have Cabrera, Prince Fielder, and Victor Martinez all in the same lineup for the next couple of years.

The Tigers still have defensive issues

It's the dangedest defensive alignment I've ever seen. The defensive metrics agree that Jhonny Peralta has been average to above-average, and the addition of Omar Infante has helped the infield defense a great deal. Austin Jackson is something of a wizard in center. So up the middle, the Tigers are sound. Old-timey baseball wisdom suggests that a team needs to worry about being strong up the middle before anything else. The Tigers are there.

But the corners are something else. Cabrera might not be that bad relative to expectations, but he's almost certainly a below-average third baseman. He pairs with Prince Fielder to make the worst first/third defensive combo in baseball. Delmon Young wears cleats with honking bike horns on the top, and he's still played 27 games in left. Andy Dirks and Quentin Berry grade out to average at best.

The real surprise? Brennan Boesch is one of the worst defenders in baseball according to UZR, defensive runs saved, range runs, plus-minus runs saved … everything. And he doesn't pass the eyeball test, either. Kurt Mensching of Bless You Boys offers the following description:

…he's rather unimpressive in the outfield. On the bright side, he's better than Delmon Young.

Damning with less-than-faint praise. The worst part is that Boesch isn't hitting, either.

The corner positions are impressively unimpressive with the glove, and it might explain why the Tigers have the worst batting average on balls in play in the American League. When it comes to individual BABIPs, Max Scherzer and Rick Porcello have the two worst marks in the major leagues. Justin Verlander's is still low, though it's still 33 points higher than last year's mark. It's all added up to a Tigers team that's almost certainly allowed more runs than they should have.

For next year, it shouldn't be as big of an issue. The whole point of moving Cabrera was to stack the lineups with as many bats as possible, and when Victor Martinez is healthy, there will be a reason for Cabrera at third. And with Omar Infante signed through next season, the offseason priority is probably going to be a corner outfielder, possibly one with a modicum of range. They should get better next year -- defensively in the outfield, and offensively at DH. which is supposed to justify the Cabrera-at-third experiment.

Right now, though, it might be costing them the AL Central. Cabrera at third gets Delmon Young in the lineup, which is a lose-lose proposition. And all of those runs lost from the corner positions over the last 128 games are probably worth an extra couple of games in the standings, which is exactly the margin between them and the White Sox.

There might be some easy fixes in the offseason, but right now, the Tigers could sure use a couple of those runs back.

(And if Victor Martinez coming back means that Delmon Young is a starting left-fielder next season… forget everything up there. Delmon's shoes will honk into the Detroit sunset. But the Tigers are too smart for that, right? Right?)

Miguel Cabrera Is Lighter, Prepared For Third Base

2012-02-10T20:50:05Z

People had a lot of issues with the Detroit Tigers signing Prince Fielder to a nine-year contract. They had issues with the part where the Tigers signed Fielder to a nine-year contract. And they have issues with the part where the Tigers plan to shift Miguel Cabrera to third base. Miguel Cabrera has been a third baseman before. It wasn't awesome.

But hey, good news! Miguel Cabrera is lighter now!

Alex Avilla joins bbtn at 330et says he's working out with Cabrera and that Cabrera has lost 25 pounds and is excited about moving to 3rd

Without any snark, it's definitely not a bad thing that Cabrera has lost weight. And it's definitely not a bad thing that Cabrera is excited about the new challenge. Cabrera could be more of a lil' bitch about the situation, like Hanley Ramirez, but he's opted to stay positive. Positive attitudes can lead to positive results!

It's just - it's not as simple as losing weight. Not that anybody's asserting that it's as simple as losing weight, but dropping 25 pounds is not going to make Cabrera a good defensive third baseman. It might help a little bit, but the issue is more about instinct, reads, and range, and being a little lighter only changes so much. Cabrera's going to try hard, and that's terrific, but he's probably still going to be more of a problem than an asset. In the field.

Good for Cabrera's heart, though. Shedding weight is good for the heart! Unless you shed too much weight.

Cecil Fielder Takes Another Chance To Rip Son Prince

2012-02-04T14:54:27Z

Friday night, Cecil Fielder and Tino Martinez were inducted into the Ted Williams Hitters Hall of Fame. Which gave Fielder a soapbox. And apparently rumors of a rapprochement between Cecil and son Prince -- who recently signed with the Detroit Tigers, for whom Prince starred 20 years ago -- were greatly exaggerated. Marc Topkin:

Cecil Fielder said Prince has no relationship with any members of their extended family, including his ill grandparents; he "hides behind" agent Scott Boras' representatives to dodge discussing his family; and he shows no appreciation for those who helped him along the way.

For example, Cecil Fielder said: "We all knew the kid was obese. He had a hard time running to first base without getting tired. You don't transform your body by yourself, you've got to have trainers, you've got to have people cooking for you, there's a lot of things that go into that. ...

"There's a lot of people that wish he would get over whatever he's got going on with his self. ... And once he gets rid of that, I think those people he needs to reach out to other than me, I think hopefully he will."

Here's the kicker: Cecil Fielder also said (as he has before) that he's "going to take the high road".

All of which leaves me with just one question:

What, exactly, would the low road look like?

SI: Moving Miguel Cabrera To Third Base A Big And Strange Mistake

2012-01-27T23:49:51Z

Our first surprise this week came when Prince Fielder signed a contract with the Detroit Tigers. He signed a nine-year contract with the Detroit Tigers! If you went out today and bought 100 parakeets, almost all of them would be dead of natural causes before Prince Fielder's contract expires.

Our second surprise this week came when the Tigers said that, in order to accommodate Fielder at first base, they're moving Miguel Cabrera to third. Cabrera has been a third baseman before - hell, Cabrera has been a shortstop before - but a third baseman these days he ain't. It seems like a hell of a gamble.

SI's Joe Sheehan doesn't like the gamble. In his words:

The Tigers simply don't have the roster to have forcing Cabrera to third base make any sense at all. It's one thing to take a huge defensive hit to get your best team on the field. It's another to do it so that you create at-bats for a DH, in Young, with a career .288/.321/.428 slash, or to get a 26-year-old fourth outfielder with 78 MLB appearances into the lineup.

It'd be one thing if the Tigers had a good DH. They don't. Victor Martinez is missing the year. As is, the Tigers are planning to put Fielder and Cabrera at the corners so that they can give the DH slot to hitters who aren't very good. There's something to be said for the fact that most players are reluctant to DH, and Cabrera and Fielder probably have their egos. There's also something to be said for the fact that players should do what their teams want them to do. If Cabrera doesn't want to DH, but if Cabrera DH'ing is in the best interests of the team, Cabrera should DH.

Anyway, we'll see how this goes, and for how long the Tigers keep it up. In fairness, while Sheehan talks about how Cabrera is too big for third base, Pablo Sandoval has an outstanding career UZR. Miguel Cabrera, though, doesn't. He has a bad career UZR at first, he has a bad career UZR at third, he has a bad career UZR in left field, and he has a bad career UZR in right field. So. Experimentation!

Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols Deals Leave NL Weaker (Again)

2012-01-27T20:41:56Z

Point: Look at all these awesome first basemen!

There will probably be three first basemen on the American League All-Star roster this year. They had four in 2010, but one of those was Ty Wigginton, who made it for the Orioles under the "This Time Everyone Gets a Ribbon!" clause that requires every team to have at least one player on the All-Star roster. That means that one of Adrian Gonzalez, Prince Fielder, Albert Pujols, and Mark Teixeira probably doesn't make the team.

You might say, "Teixeira!", but remember that he has the support of Yankees partisans everywhere. They are legion. He could get voted in. And he could also have a hot start, being Teixeira and all, that would make him impossible to snub. That would mean one of Gonzalez, Fielder, or Pujols staying home.

Unless all four are taken. Pujols can play third! But then you have to consider the up and comers like Eric Hosmer and Carlos Santana. You also have to remember that every team has to have a representative, which gives someone like Paul Konerko a good shot. And if Bartolo Colon can snort his own dried umbilical-cord powder and come back to resume his career, there's a chance for a former MVP like Justin Morneau to overcome his concussion problems and be what he once was.

You probably don't' care about this stuff in June, so you sure as heck don't care about it in January, but here's the point: Man, the American League is stacked at first base. It's unlikely that Pujols, Fielder, Gonzalez, and Teixeira will all make the Hall of Fame, but they've certainly had Hall-worthy peaks, and now they're all in the same league. I'd wager those are four of the game's five best first basemen, and I'd give Hosmer and/or Santana (when he stops catching completely) decent odds of cracking that top five sometime soon.

If you don't have a great-hitting first baseman in the American League, you're behind the curve. The A's (Daric Barton), Blue Jays (Adam Lind), Rangers (Mitch Moreland), and Orioles (Chris Davis) have some hoping and wishing to do when it comes to their first baseman.

Counterpoint: Holy hell, National League.

Joey Votto is great. If Lance Berkman continues to age gracefully, he'll remain an MVP candidate. Ryan Howard will still be overpaid when he returns from his injury, but he's certainly not bad.

Freddie Freeman has a nice career ahead of him. So should Ike Davis, if he's not broken. Gaby Sanchez is alright. Todd Helton had a nice year last year, though he's 38.

…

Wait, the Diamondbacks re-signed Lyle Overbay on purpose, taking away at-bats from Paul Goldschmidt?

…

Aubrey Huff and James Loney will start for the Giants and Dodgers. Oh.

...

Mat Gamel, Bryan LaHair, Brett Wallace, and Garrett Jones all play in the same division. It'll be as if Votto and Berkman bit their necks and extracted the hits.

...

Adam LaRoche.

...

Well played, American League. When you stuck a hose in the first-baseman barrel and started sucking, you somehow ended up sucking less when the siphoning was over. A lot less. There was a talent drain to the AL (again), and it was focused on a single position. Last year, first base was the most productive offensive position for the National League, but it just barely beat out right field. With Pujols and Fielder (and Carlos Peña) switching leagues, next year could be the first time it isn't the league's most productive position since Barry Bonds was a ringer for the left fielders in 2004.

At the end of the season, though, there will still be a best-of-seven quirkathon to decide which league is better! So buck up, National League. It doesn't matter who your star first basemen are if David Freese can be better for a week than all of them lassoed together. But when Garrett Jones or Aubrey Huff has a decent chance to be the median talent at first base, there's a chance that this isn't the Golden Era of National League first basemen.

Welcome To The American League, Prince Fielder

2012-01-27T19:38:47Z

One of my hobby horses over the last some years has been the American League's obvious superiority over the National League, which of course some National League fans would just like to wish away.

Sorry. That doesn't work. MGL:

Since 2005 (an arbitrary beginning point mind you), the AL has a .555 WP in IL games. That is a lot! That suggests an average AL team would be a 90 win team in the NL.

My research in the past (do a search in this blog and I think I wrote a piece a while back on THT or BP) indicated that the edge has mostly been in pitching and in fact the NL may have had equal or better hitting than the AL in the last few years. Keep in mind this has nothing to do with league rpg or ERA or the fact that the AL bats 9 real hitters and the NL only 8 (plus pinch hitters for the pitcher of course). When we say that the AL is a better pitching team that means that if you took a pitcher from the AL and put him the NL, his rank among pitchers and thus his value, like WAR, would go up. Same for batters.

Mickey then runs through some moderately complicated calculations, most of which I moderately understand. Anyway, the upshot is that in 2011, nearly all of the American League's big edge was due to better pitching: pitching, a little fielding, and a teeny tiny bit of better hitting.

Has the pitching equation changed this winter? Not really. I believe that only two truly notable starting pitchers have changed leagues: Hiroki Kuroda to the American, Mark Buehrle to the National. Well, the Athletics' housecleaning sent both Gio Gonzalez and Trevor Cahill to the National League. But Edwin Jackson and/or Roy Oswalt seem likely to move from the National to the American. Overall, the equation's not likely to change much in 2012; if the American League was the better league because of better pitching last season, the American League will probably be the better league because of better pitching this season.

Which I bring up today because a) I grew up resenting the National League, always bullying my poor little American Leaguers in the All-Star Game; and 2) hey, we have another reason to think the Detroit Tigers aren't getting the Prince Fielder they think they're getting.

We know that baseball players typically peak between the ages of 26 and 28, and Fielder turns 28 this spring. We also know that heavy players, historically speaking, don't age well. At all.

We know that Comerica Park is tough on left-handed power hitters. How tough? Over the last three seasons, Comerica has been the fifth-toughest (for homers) in the American League. Granted, Fielder doesn't hit many cheap home runs and might be little affected by that spacious right-field territory. But I'll bet you Comerica costs him two or three taters per season.

And now we know that Prince Fielder will soon be facing tougher pitchers than he's used to. And with smaller benches in the American League, there are presumably a few more lefty relievers available to A.L. managers.

Prediction: Prince Fielder hits 32 home runs in 2012. Leaving a lot of fans in Detroit to wonder if 32 home runs are worth $23 million. Before the decline begins.

What Twitter's Saying About Miguel Cabrera: Third Baseman

2012-01-27T16:06:23Z

Prediction: When the Detroit Tigers open the second half of the 2012 season in Baltimore, Maryland, Miguel Cabrera will not be in the lineup at third base.

Thanks for coming, everyone; please drive safely on your way home!

Nah, there's more. I'm not as clever as some of the other wits in these parts. I gotta expound. But first, see if you can spot the really hilarious part -- unless you're Brandon Inge, or a Detroit Tiger who pitches baseball for a living -- in this tweet:

@JimBowdenESPNxm
JIM BOWDEN Jim Leylands lineup as of today: " Jackson CF;Boesch RF;Cabrera 3B;Fielder 1B;Young LF;Avila C;Peralta SS;Dirks/Thomas/Kelly DH Raburn 2B"
Jan 26 via web Favorite Retweet Reply

You think Bowden's just making things up, because he can? Via Joanne C. Gerstner in The New York Times, we have an unimpeachable source regarding the Detroit manager's thinkings:

He already knows what his preferred lineup would be: 1. Austin Jackson, 2. Brennan Boesch, 3. Cabrera, 4. Fielder, 5. Delmon Young, 6. Alex Avila, 7. Jhonny Peralta, 8. Andy Dirks or Clete Thomas or Don Kelly, and 9. Ryan Rayburn.

"I’ve got a lot of nice pieces to the puzzle, now it’s my job to put it together," Leyland said.

Aaron Gleeman:

Imagine a world in which Prince Fielder, Miguel Cabrera, and Delmon Young are on the same AL team and someone else is the designated hitter.

Joe Sheehan:

Any time you can put a potential -40 defender on the field so that Don Kelly can DH, you have to do it.

Not just put him there; leave him there! For the whole game, even if you're up 2-1 in the bottom of the ninth with a ground-ball pitcher on the mound! If you believe Jim Leyland, anyway.

All of this was occasioned by Thursday's press conference, in which the Tigers introduced their new first baseman to the world. And apparently Prince Fielder, who of course was promised first base all to himself before signing for nine years and $214 million, isn't at all concerned about pushing Miggy to third base.

Craig Calcaterra:

Fielder: "I'm confident in Miguel doing a good job. That's where he started out, at third base." Which is why Chipper should play shortstop

See what he did there? And Chipper's not the only one. Alex Rodriguez started out at shortstop. So did Mike Morse. Alfonso Soriano started out at second base. Jim Thome started out at third base. Victor Martinez started out at catcher. So did Pablo Sandoval. Art, we can do this all day long.

Finally, just as silly as Miguel Cabrera - Third Base ...

Tom Edwards:

So to be clear, the Tigers lost their starting DH, went out and signed Prince Fielder, and now all they need is... a DH? #misconfused

What, you don't think Andy Dirks and/or Clete Thomas and/or Don Kelly are up to the job?

Remember my prediction? I think that Dave Dombrowski and perhaps even Jim Leyland know that Miguel Cabrera has little or no business at third base; if he did, he wouldn't have left there in the first place. I think they also want to keep their biggest star -- well, now their second-biggest star, technically speaking -- happy, and if that means playing third base on Opening Day, so be it.

If you need actual evidence that this is largely about Cabrera's feelings, here's the wrap of an interview in which Leyland supposedly said he wouldn't bump Cabrera from third base, even in the late innings of a close game?

I think that within two or three months, it will become apparent to everyone, including Cabrera, that third base just isn't a happy place for him. He might volunteer for a happier place, or his manager might just send him there. And when it happens, Brandon Inge and a bunch of pitchers will throw a big honking party to celebrate a glorious Triumph of Reason.

Poll

How long will Miguel Cabrera last as the Tigers' every-day third baseman?

through sometime during spring training

171 votes

through Memorial Day

181 votes

through the All-Star break

43 votes

through the whole 2012 season

71 votes

for years and years and years

69 votes

535 votes | Poll has closed

SI.com: Tigers Unwise To Spend So Much On Prince Fielder

2012-01-26T22:36:23Z

SI.com's Cliff Corcoran notes that plenty of great hitters have put on weight as they got older; almost every player (and non-player) does. And many of those great hitters just kept on hitting, from Willie Stargell and Harmon Killebrew to Frank Thomas and Jim Thome. But Prince Fielder, Corcoran notes, is different:

Those all-time greats had room to add weight as they aged. Fielder, like the group that included his father, does not. As a result of that difference, when Fielder begins to add weight in his thirties, as most athletes (and non-athletes) do, it could slow him down to such a degree that he's simply unable to compete at the major league level. That is the trend for players his size. They don't have declines, they just vanish because there's no room for them to get bigger or slower and continue to compete at the highest level. The gap between being a star player and out of baseball is tiny for players like Fielder compared to more athletic players who can age more gracefully.

I don't have a great deal to add, except that we're in uncharted territory here. And that I would like to have been a fly on the wall when Dave Dombrowski was trying to convince his owner that nine years is a really, really, really long time.