Tram on the Move?

Ken Rosenthal, writer for FoxSports.com, has a new article up on the site regarding little news tidbits from around Major League Baseball. Why this concerns Tigers fans is the headline of the article: "Trammell will likely take fall in Detroit"

So what's the reasoning behind this? Well, the Tigers are a team that has spent a lot of money the last couple of seasons to bring in names to help right the ship. It has been a great while since a winning season in Detroit. Rosenthal picks up on this and then adds why this is his thought on the situation with the Tigers:

As the Tigers' season crumbles, it's becoming increasingly doubtful that Alan Trammell will remain the team's manager, especially with Jim Leyland looming as a possible replacement.

One game under .500 on Aug. 23, the Tigers were within reach of their first winning season since 1993. But the team scored only 12 runs during its recent nine-game losing streak, and its late-season collapse — complete with lapses in concentration and breakdowns in team play — is the kind that typically gets a manager fired.

So, it seems as if the Tigers recent mishaps on the field have triggered a response towards Alan Trammell. Hired prior to the 2003 season as a public relations move (which is the opinion of many Tigers fans), it has been a rocky path for Tram as the skipper in Detroit. First he was put through one of the worst baseball seasons in recent history as the Tigers only won 43 games. After that season came the signing of Pudge Rodriguez and Rondell White, producing a 29 game improvement. While 72 wins for the Tigers in 2004 sounded good at the time, it may have hurt Tram's chances for a long term tenure with the Tigers, as the expectations were raised...and this was even before last offseason in which the Tigers paid out big bucks to bring in Magglio Ordonez, Troy Percival, and Kyle Farnsworth. Even though the Tigers were still a .500 type ballclub, fans and the front office in Detroit want results, and this means bringing a winning season.

So, is the non-success of this team to break over the .500 plateau all on the shoulders of Tram? No. But as Rosenthal said, when a team looks as bad as the Tigers have in the second half of the season, most notably the last 12-15 games, the manager is more than likely going to get the fingers pointed at him.

In my opinion, I would like to see Trammell get a little more time at the helm of this club. He has grown up with a lot of these players as a manager, and I feel it is the front office's duty to let him finish out his contract in Detroit. While we all want to see results now, who doesn't, I still feel that this ballclub coming into the year was one that was going to hover around the .500 mark. While they did for most of the season, and more than likely will finish several games under the breakeven mark, I would like to see Tram get a chance to manage a ballclub with more talent than he has had in his three years. Hopefully our front office can do something about that this offseason.

And I'm not even going to go into the whole Jim Leyland thing, that's for another time.