Tigers owner says he knows he must spend to win.

Thursday, January 29, 2009
Tigers
Tigers owner Ilitch: I won't change
Tigers owner says he has no regrets about last season's payroll, knows he must spend to win.
Lynn Henning / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- He had intended to talk about hockey, exclusively, when he showed up Wednesday at Joe Louis Arena.

But Mike Ilitch is rarely separated from his baseball team.

After participating in a news conference more akin to a Red Wings celebration (Henrik Zetterberg's 12-year contract extension was announced), Ilitch talked about the other team he owns, the Tigers, and their catastrophic fall in 2008 from supposed contenders to a last-place team..

The good news, from Ilitch's perspective, is his Tigers have punched up their pitching and defense during the offseason.

"I think we were dealing with some areas that surfaced that hurt us bad," Ilitch said, speaking of the team's problems on the mound and with the infield.

"Defense, and we addressed the pitching situation. They turned out to be our weaknesses. But now, hopefully, they're our strengths."

A year ago the Tigers supposedly were on a merry path to the playoffs, if not to the World Series. A huge trade had brought slugger Miguel Cabrera and then-acclaimed left-handed pitcher Dontrelle Willis to Detroit. A new shortstop (Edgar Renteria) and a supposedly hard-hitting left fielder (Jacque Jones) also were added.

The Tigers were popular picks to destroy anything they confronted -- in either league.

But what they instead met were a slew of injuries or outright failings by their pitching staff. Problems were compounded when the infield defense was often an accident waiting to happen.

The Tigers finished 74-88, last in the A.L. Central Division.

More shocking was that the collapse came during a year Ilitch doled out New York-style money in a bid to make a one-season assault on the World Series. The payroll approached $140 million. Ilitch said Wednesday he was "humbled" by 2008, in step with the team's president and general manager, Dave Dombrowski, and manager, Jim Leyland.

But while the payroll has decreased because of expired contracts (Pudge Rodriguez, Kenny Rogers, Todd Jones, etc.), Ilitch still will spend more than $110 million toward making last year's nightmare this season's turnaround.

"I don't regret it," Ilitch said of last year's acknowledged push to win it all. "I know we take chances every so often. We missed on some. We've got to be more careful."

But he won't be throttling back, he said, in part because baseball's status as a sport with no salary cap mandates a different approach.

"I'm not gonna change," he said, with a nod toward his hockey team and the NHL's salary cap that puts a ceiling on spending. "It's not like this, where we're restricted."

Ilitch said he will be in Lakeland, Fla., for spring training.

You can reach Lynn Henning at (313) 222-2472 lynn.henning@detnews.com

He'd better be in Lakeland! Stop the country club atmosphere! That is for after you've been to the World Series, not before!

Tigers should have won it in 2006

gs78 wrote:

Tigers should have won it in 2006

yes they should have, but we were only as strong as our weakest links....

laprimamirala wrote:

gs78 wrote:

Tigers should have won it in 2006

yes they should have, but we were only as strong as our weakest links....

And after watching the 2006 WS again, I was shocked at how badly Pudge and Granderson did against St. L. Also, the pitchers had 5 errors and Inge messed up too.

Thank God for Kenny Rogers hot pitching, or the Tigers would have been shut out in the WS!

we really choked, sad to say...

laprimamirala wrote:

we really choked, sad to say...

Yep.

can't buy that WS trophy!

I figure if they can't get it together this year, then look to 2011 or 2012, when they have some more youth from the minors brought up and seasoned.

*sigh* at least we're not like last year, struttin' around like we'd won the Series already!