In 2025, center field was a major weakness for the Detroit Tigers. That wasn’t supposed to be the case; Parker Meadows finally had his breakout in 2024, Matt Vierling looked like a solid complementary
piece who could bounce to multiple positions, and even Wenceel Perez had a solid enough season to pencil him in as a fourth outfielder with some upside.
That isn’t how things went, though. Injuries forced Javier Baez into full time duty early on, where he shockingly earned an All-Star berth before collapsing. Even with Baez’ contributions, Detroit’s center fielders slashed .229/.284/.366 and struck out 27.3% of the time. Their wRC+ of 80 ranked a paltry 23rd in the league, and of the 2025 playoff teams, only Cleveland earned less production from their center fielders. Defensively, the Tigers didn’t stand out in center field either, checking in with roughly average defense overall.
It stands to reason, then, that the team should be trying to upgrade center field in preparation for 2026. Unfortunately, that gets complicated surprisingly quickly.
Firstly, it’d be fair to point to injuries as a major culprit. Vierling missed almost all year with shoulder injuries, Meadows clearly never got comfortable after his pre-season nerve issue, and even Perez only played 100 games around a lower back issue. If the team wanted to run it back, one of those guys probably gets healthy and posts a decent 2026; good luck figuring it out from here, though.
A second issue is there are, as usual, few clear upgrades available. The trade market is almost entirely barren, barring a major surprise like Jarren Duran, and there’s only a few starting CF on the free agent market. Teams don’t usually let strong up-the-middle players go until they absolutely have to.
To keep things simple, let’s look at the three best options available in free agency, including their projected contracts and their fit with Detroit. I’ll be using the FanGraphs Crowd Sourced contracts as the baseline, since those have been generally accurate predictions in years past.
Ultimately, the Tigers have enough internal options to get by with that it’s probably unlikely that they’ll be seriously pursuing center field help, but it clearly one of the biggest weak spots in the roster right now. So if they did go add a good player the benefits could be outsized in comparision to making a minor upgrade at another position.
Cody Bellinger
Contract: 5 years/$135M
For a team that wants a real hitter up the middle and has money to spend, Bellinger is the best available. He isn’t the superstar expected from his Los Angeles days, but he’s an average center fielder that hits like a right fielder. Kind of.
Bellinger’s 122 wRC+ over the last three years is excellent and comes with an entirely remade offensive profile after a few years in the weeds with LA. Unfortunately, that new offensive profile is a bit atypical. Bellinger traded most of his power potential for improved contact, then continued to hit for power anyways. Some would point to his move to the famously lefty-friendly Yankee Stadium, but he did the same thing in Wrigley in 2023. One major plus is his reverse platoon splits from last year. There’s surely a bit of luck involved with that, but he also has better walk and strikeout rates versus lefty pitching that speak to a different approach entirely.
Defensively, Bellinger hasn’t been a full-time centerfielder since 2022, but the tools are all still in place. He’s just as fast as ever and his corner outfield and first base work have both been superb, so he should be fine for a year or two.
Theoretically, a year or two is all Detroit needs, since Max Clark is lurking in the upper minors. Signing Bellinger for five years, then moving either Clark or Bellinger to right field around 2027 seems like one of several logical plans. In some ways, Bellinger is the perfect fit for this team. His speed, contact, and flexibility all fit their gameplan. In others, though, he’s a square peg in a round whole; he’s yet another lefty in a lineup stuffed already, and like most of the lineup, he’s more of a complementary piece than a central one.
If the team went this route, understanding Bellinger would be due a bit of regression coming to Comerica, it would be their most aggressive and surprising move to date. It would also, definitively, improve their 2026 team. He already was offered a qualifying offer in 2024, too, so Detroit wouldn’t even lose a pick for signing him. It would be unexpected, but it might not be wrong.
Trent Grisham
Contract: 3 years/$55M
In many ways, Grisham is like Bellinger. Kind of. He surprisingly came back to life with the 2025 Yankees, is a bit of a tweener defensively, and it’s hard to say if his new offensive gameplan will hold up. His shorter track record and lower ceiling put his spending closer to Detroit’s expected market, but he did receive a qualifying offer.
On the offensive side, Grisham is a power-first centerfielder. He doesn’t swing a lot, smashes the ball when he does, and strikes out a lot. Typically, opposing pitchers helped neutralize this by pouring in first-pitch strikes, knowing Grisham would likely take. He wised up, though, started swinging early, and thrived in 2025 to the tune of 34 home runs and a 129 wRC+. If that was all to his story, he’d be due for a contract roughly twice as large as currently projected.
Unfortunately, there’s a lot of risk, too. He’s gotten slow and isn’t really a viable center fielder, especially someplace as big as Comerica Park. It was honestly a surprise to see him in center more than Bellinger last year. He is probably better served avoiding lefties, or at least hiding at the bottom of the order against them. His three-true-outcomes style is a poor fit for a park like Comerica and might not persist into his 30s.
Generally, shopping in this aisle of free agency is dangerous work. The hitters all have legitimate upside, but also severe issues. Their contracts tend to split the middle, while their production rarely does. Tyler O’Neil signed for 3 years, $49.5M; Teoscar Hernandez for 3 years, $66M. Which one is Grisham? I don’t know. I also don’t think he’s a good enough fit to find out.
Harrison Bader
Contract: 2 years/$25M
On paper, Bader should be the perfect fit for Detroit. After years of battling injuries with St Louis, he finally stayed healthy and delivered the high-end season everyone’s been waiting for. As a righty with a superb glove, he fits Detroit’s needs very well. Kind of.
Bader’s defense has never been in question. He’s an elite center fielder, full stop, and has been for years. He moved to left field in deference to Byron Buxton, but was fantastic in center when given opportunities.
On the offensive side, he finally hit! He nearly doubled his walk rate, which is good. Unfortunately, he also increased his strikeout rate from 22% to 27% and his BABIP from .276 to .359. He swung harder, hit the ball harder, and made way less contact, which is a weird solution for a smaller center fielder whose best asset is his speed.
His contract expectations account for all of this, though. The floor is an elite center fielder with probably bad offense, but maybe some of those changes stick. I’d be willing to look past all of this risk, except for one issue: he has reverse splits over the last two years. Whatever changes he’s made to try and become relevant again have left him vulnerable to left handed pitching. On most teams, that would be good news! For Detroit, though, this hurts more than most. They desperately need someone to split up Riley Greene, Kerry Carpenter, and Colt Keith; even at his best, Bader hasn’t been that player.
When it comes down to it, Detroit’s options are limited. The center field market is sparse and the front office probably won’t have the resources to add multiple high-impact hitters in one winter. Of these options, I’m absolutely advocating for Bellinger, but if it came down to Bellinger or Alex Bregman, I’m not sure which helps the team more. Bader’s reverse platoon splits really hurt the idea of a Meadows/Bader duo to upgrade on a budget. As the team looks to capitalize on Tarik Skubal’s final year, they’ll need a few notable upgrades, and center field does stand out as one of the two best positions to do so. They might have to get more creative than we’ve seen to fix this issue
