Drew Smyly deserves to be in Detroit Tigers’ starting rotation – MLB News
It will be interesting to see if the Detroit Tigers can find a decent deal to trade starting pitcher Rick Porcello, who had a great time on the mound in the past season. Very rumours have been including the Tigers could send the starter to Baltimore Orioles,
San Diego Padres or Pittsburgh Pirates. The Tigers have not made any official announcement on the matter. It seems they are playing a waiting. Several National League teams are also interested in acquiring Porcello’s services, reports Detroit News.com.
The reason why the Tigers want to end their relationship with Porcello is pretty simple. After they signed on Anibal Sanchez to a five year deal, the Tigers have a surplus in pitching department of the game. As it has been the case for last few years, ace
Justin Verlander will be Tigers’ No.1 starting pitcher. Verlander was the 2011 Most Valuable Player Award winner and perhaps he is one of the most dominating pitchers in the American League.
Remaining four starting spots are expected to be filled out by Anibal Sanchez, Doug Fister, Max Scherzer and Drew Smyly, who is the youngest of them all. Porcello initially had to compete with Smyly for the fifth starting spot but it seems Smyly impressed
Manager Jim Leyland and General Manager Dave Dombrowski big time with his consistent performances in 2012.
“June 10 he didn't make it past the third inning, leaving the game with a blister. In his next appearance more than two weeks later, Smyly made arguably his worst start of the season: six runs allowed to the Rangers in just four innings and change”, said
Kurt Mensching of Detroit.news.com.
“He spent much of his next six weeks either on the disabled list or pitching for the Toledo Mud Hens before making a return to Detroit in late August for a couple of starts and a couple of relief appearances. Was Smyly's sudden downfall due to teams making
adjustments while he didn't?”, he added.
Smyly won a spot out of Spring Training and made pitching look extremely easy in first half of the season. It will be interesting to see if he can continue the good work in 2013.
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