Happy Monday, everyone, though it is a bittersweet one as it is the first Monday of the offseason for Tigers fans. While the postseason will get into gear this week, the Tigers played their final games of the year over the weekend, and even those were a bit of a bummer. Thankfully, the festivities of saying goodbye to one of the greatest Tigers of all time helped create an atmosphere of happiness at the park as fans had an opportunity to send off Justin Verlander and cry a few tears in the process.
It was a lovely weekend that reminds us all of the beauty of this game.
We’ll cover the highlights of the weekend in a different post, so here we’ll touch on some broader baseball topics like the first offseason managerial cuts, some previews of the postseason, and looking at what might have been the final game of another old friend, Max Scherzer.
Let’s just jump right into it.
Detroit Tigers News
- Cody Stavenhagen reports on the touching moment when Justin Verlander’s daughter Genevieve, came out to relieve him in his final outing. Of his emotional final weekend, his wife Kate Upton—who worked alongside manager AJ Hinch to coordinate that tear-jerker last moment, said this of Detroit and Tigers’ fans:
“I’m just so grateful for the city and to the fans who love him almost as much as I do.”
- The Tigers had a heartfelt message for fans after a pretty uneven season.
- Our obvious pick to win AL Rookie of the Year.
- The little girl who invented the iconic McGonigoggles got to throw out the final first pitch of the season.
MLB News
- Why does ZiPS seem to hate the Brewers?
- Dan Wilson is the first of the “offseason” managerial cuts and will not be returning to the Mariners next year.
- Looking at the weakest positions on the remaining NL contenders.
- Steven Kwan is bouncing back in a major way for the Guardians.
- Why scouting still matters in the analytics and data era.
- Pete Alonso becomes the first player to win RBI titles in both leagues.
- The Phillies had to get through quite a week to punch their ticket to the postseason.
- If this was Max Scherzer’s final game of his career, he went out on a high note.
- A final look at the regular season stat leaders.
- The Dodgers ended their season with 100 wins, but is Shohei Ohtani going to be ready for the postseason?
- Ranking the lineups of the remaining playoff-contending teams. And we can’t forget the pitching.
- Some of the key takeaways from the 2026 regular season.
- Giants’ manager Tony Vitello reached an MLB-high seven ejections by the final game of the season.
- ESPN’s Postseason Preview.
- Colson Montgomery would rather focus on the “positives” instead of being reminded that he set the record for batter strikeouts this season.
- For the first time in club history the Brewers have elected a team captain, and it will be Christian Yelich. ($)
- A postseason power ranking. ($)
- A revival of the musical “Damn Yankees” is heading to Broadway with Neil Patrick Harris and… the Orioles?
- This is not a good idea.
- Pope Leo playing it coy when asked if he offered a little divine intervention for the White Sox this season.
