Detroit Tigers: It’s Time To Have Faith in Nick Castellanos

The Detroit Tigers need to have a little faith in their emerging young third baseman, Nick Castellanos and stop treating him like a platoon player.

One week ago today, the Detroit Tigers had just wrapped up an impressive 4-0 home opener victory over the New York Yankees to stay perfect through the season’s first four games. The hitting star for the Tigers on the afternoon was Nick Castellanos, who had gone 4-for-4.

After notching a single to center in the bottom of the eighth to earn his fourth hit, Castellanos was promptly removed for pinch runner, Andrew Romine, with the purpose of replacing him in the field in the top of the ninth. Heading off the field, you could almost feel the frustration of Nick, even eliciting a comment from Rod Allen saying “Nick’s not going to be happy with this.”

Indeed he wasn’t.

While being interviewed by Johnny Kane of Fox Sports Detroit (though I’ll admit these post game interviews are rarely hard-hitting and never get much more than tired sports clichés), you could sense he wasn’t very happy with the situation.

Even more inexplicable was the decision for manager Brad Ausmus to leave him completely out of the starting lineup for Saturday’s game. Ausmus chalked it up to getting Mike Aviles his first action of the season. This is understandable, but the reason Aviles was added to the Tigers was his versatility to play infield and outfield positions, making him able to give rest to several other players that did not have perfect days at the plate.

This is the problem that Ausmus seems unable to break free from. He follows so closely to the imaginary “manager guidebook,” that says the bench players must be rotated in and that defensive-challenged players must be removed in late innings. If Ausmus would trust his instincts a little more, he’d know to go with the hot-hand and sub Aviles in another place. Additionally, the day before, there was no reason to remove Castellanos in a four-run game.

As it happened, Casty did play in Saturday’s game. While the Tigers were trying to play catch-up during the coldest game in Comerica Park history, he came up in the ninth, pinch-hitting for Anthony Gose, and predictably struck out in the 8-4 defeat to New York.

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My contention is if the Tigers really want Castellanos to take that mythical “next step,” they need to put their faith in him. He cannot be treated like a platoon player where he is the first one to sit to allow the bench players to start and should not be removed from the field in the ninth inning of seemingly every single game. Sure, if it’s a 1- or 2-run save situation, fine, take him out. But there is no reason to sub him out in a four-run game.

In Thursday afternoon’s 7-4 victory over the Pirates, Castellanos once again starred, going 3-for-4 with a homer and four RBIs. The effort raised his batting average to .333 with an OPS of .923, which is currently higher than Miguel Cabrera (.768) and Justin Upton (.775). Yet this was still not enough to keep him in the game, being lifted again for Romine, who promptly dropped a pop fly to start the ninth inning. Jeez, Nick could have done that….

Beyond Ausmus’ perceived mistrust of Castellanos is some fans’ disdain for him. It might be because he was a prized prospect in the Tigers’ system for many years and fans feel he will never live up to his expectations.

Many of today’s baseball fans expect rookies to make an immediate impact on the field. Tigers’ fans have watched from afar as Mike Trout, Bryce Harper, and Kris Bryant have gone from top prospect to major league All-Star in a blink of an eye. Sadly, this has not been the case for Castellanos.

He did have a torrid finish to last season and is starting off this season hot as well, so perhaps he has arrived. No, Nick Castellanos is not going to be on the level of some of the aforementioned young icons of the game, but he can still become a very steady cornerstone of this franchise for the next decade.

Some players take a bit longer to get it together. Alan Trammell, for instance, took three full seasons to hit .300 for the first time, and if Castellanos keeps it up, his third full season could hit that plateau.

Again, I am not saying he will become the next Tram, who should be in the Hall-of-Fame, but if he can annually put an average together in the .280+ category with 20-25 homers, and hover around 100 RBIs during his prime, that will still be a very productive career.

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As for defense, he will never have the glove of Trammell, and is likely headed to DH when Victor Martinez‘s time with the club is done, but he is not a huge drop-off from Romine in the field (career fielding percentage of .958 vs .969, although Nick was better in 2015 at third base, .966 vs .961 )

All we as fans, and Ausmus as the manager, have to do is have just a little faith.