Detroit Tigers

• Year: 1996
• Record: 53-109 (second most losses in franchise history)
• Win Percentage: .327
• Win Percentage Change: -90 from the year before
• Run Differential: -320
• Pythagorean Record: 56-106
• AL Finish: 14th of 14 teams
• Manager: Buddy Bell
• Best Transaction: This one is arguably Randy Smith’s best move as GM of the Tigers, he sent pitcher Greg Gohr to the Angels for Damion Easley. Gohr was a bust with the Tigers and the Angels thought they could get him on track.
  

(Also featured on Rotoprofessor.com)

While most 20-year-olds are in the midst of their college careers, a different type of career has begun for a Detroit Tigers pitcher.

One of the more highly touted prospects coming into this season, Rick Porcello slid into the fifth spot of the Tigers' rotation and proved that even the least experienced arms can have success in the major leagues.

• Year: 1952
• Record: 50-104
• Win %: .325
• Win % Change: -149 from year before
• Run Differential: -149
• Pythagorean Record: 58-96
• AL Finish: 8th of 8
• Manager: Red Rolfe and Fred Hutchinson
• Best Transaction: Signed Harvey Kuenn as an amateur free agent.  Kuenn ended up a being a “professional hitter” and played in Detroit until 1960.  As a Tiger he led the AL in hits four times and doubles twice.  Sadly, he didn’t really do much for this particular Tigers team, appearing in only 19 games at the end of the season.  The Tig
  

Scott Sizemore, a top prospect for the Detroit Tigers and heir apparent at second base, fractured a bone in his left ankle during Thursday's game in the Arizona Fall League.

The next step in this series of looks at roster moves that face the Tigers is to look at the arbitration eligible players who don’t have the option of turning their team down. These are players with three or more years of service time (usually—it’s explained here ) who are still under team control, but get to negotiate their salary through arbitration.

Since the 1931 season, the Detroit Tigers uniforms have featured numbers assigned to each player.  Our “By The Numbers” series takes a look at the best, or sometimes just the most interesting, player to wear each number.  We have reached number 8 in our series, if you would like to catch up on the first seven, click here to find the earlier installments.

This is the fourth installment of a series in which I ponder personnel decisions that need to be made regarding players who were on the team in 2009. You can read the first three here , here and here .

David Dombrowski has been President/GM of the Tigers for eight baseball seasons, and just what has the team accomplished?

One playoff appearance.

DD is 1-for-8, and that’s a .125 BA—something that even Gerald Laird would scoff at.

It’s time to take a serious look at how Dombrowski has been minding the store.

It’s one thing to miss the playoffs; it’s quite another to do so consistently in a notoriously weak division. It’s yet another to do it whilst frittering away the owner’s money like it grows on trees.