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Should The Detroit Tigers Be Worried About Joe Nathan?

By Souichi Terada

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With Opening Day mere weeks away Detroit Tigers fans should be excited with anticipation. After all, this Tigers team has gone on to win the AL Central 4 years in a row.

Their AL Central supremacy though should be challenged this year. The Kansas City Royals went on the World Series last year and the Cleveland Indians have been consistently in the playoff race the last few seasons.

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With an improved AL Central then every game seemingly counts, even in April. The Tigers in the last two seasons have won the Central division by the slimmest of margins of a mere game.

That’s why the Tigers and their fans should be a bit worried of Manager Brad Ausmus putting a lot of trust in Joe Nathan. They cannot afford a pitcher to fail miserably and blow games consistently down the stretch or otherwise.

There are already plenty of question marks about Nathan and his effectiveness come the regular season.

Local and national media have already questioned Nathan countless times. He basically has a microscope on him at all times now especially during Spring Training.

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Detroit Tigers

Nathan has a 5.87 ERA in 7.2 innings this spring. While Spring Training stats should be taken with a grain of salt all the reports accompanying his stats tell a same story.

By all means everybody seems pretty down on Nathan. His fastball command doesn’t seem to be there and at age 40 it’s just hard to see Nathan do much of anything at the Major League level.

While he seems to be committed to reinventing himself to get some success the Tigers and Ausmus must have a super short leash on Nathan. While it’s great to hear he’s working on some things the 9th inning of a 1-run game isn’t the right time or setting.

For now it is alright just because it’s Spring Training. The Tigers have the worst record in the Grapefruit League but fans shouldn’t be in the least bit concerned. These games are useless and should really be looked at as a holistic warm-up.

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In the regular season Ausmus and the Tigers front office should seriously consider replacing him in the closers role if he struggles for an extended period. Former-closer Joakim Soria already exists and should be used as as a viable backup.

The remaining $10 million on his contract is a sunk cost and really shouldn’t be an indicator of how the Tigers should use him. Winning games should be the obvious priority. Putting in a struggling Nathan to close is exactly the opposite of a winning strategy.

Every year the Tigers are looking for relief help come the Trade Deadline. With an exhausted farm system the Tigers cannot afford trading away anymore young talent to win now.

It’s bad business to not plan at least a bit for the future. With the potential of the window seemingly starting to close as the Tigers’ core is getting older, it becomes that much more important.

If Ausmus can use his relief pitchers it lessens the blow for the need of them. Like using Soria in the 9th and Nathan as mop-up duty or a less vital role. There are plenty of ways that Ausmus can maximize his bullpen’s effectiveness through match-up and splits and the like.

For now Tigers fans should be somewhat pessimistic of Nathan contributing in 2015. If he can, great, it’ll help the bullpen tons. If not, not too many people are about to be surprised because of it.

Now, your thoughts. How do you feel about Nathan in 2015? Great? Bad? Terrible? Or are you somewhat optimistic? Whatever the case, the bullpen is still a weak spot in the bullpen and the Tigers will need to deal with this weakness.

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