The Tigers are jumping in and making the first big blockbuster of the offseason, and what a doozy it is. Not only Miguel Cabrera, but also Dontrelle Willis will be Tigers. Wow.
Going to Florida will be now less than 6 prospects, headlined by young lefty Andrew Miller and Cameron Maybin, as well as catcher Mike Rabelo.
That news, coupled with this related news is a scary thought for the Tiger's cohabitants of the AL Central.
I'm not a big fan of Willis, but his ERA last year was very likely the cause of some terrible luck as his peripheral stats changed very litter (his HR rate went way up, but his GB rate stayed steady) and he is likely to help the Tiger's staff. Cabrera is obviously a monster, and with repors of him working on his physical conditioning, much more likely to stay at third.
The question for the Tigers, where will Brandon Inge play? Perhpas Cabrera will play first so as to not lose Inge's superior defense.
The question for the rest of us is how do we deal with a batting order containing Curtis Granderson, Ivan Rodriguez, Gary Shefield, Magglio Ordonez, Carlos Guillen, AND Miguel Cabrera, all along with no real below average hitter. That is a fearsome offensive team, and with Verlander, Rodgers, Willis, and Bonderman in the rotation....
The question for the Twins is, how does this effect the Santana talks. The Angels deny being in the conversation, but they were trying very hard to land Cabrera, so does this push the Angels in harder? Haren really isn't an option for the in their division, I and I really don't see Erik Bedard ending up anywhere but Baltimore.
We'll see how this plays out.