Last year wasn't the right time for the Tigers. This year, they couldn't say no. Justin Verlander is returning to Detroit on a one-year deal worth a reported $13 million, the latest addition to a rotation that looks like one of the best in baseball.
Verlander, who turns 43 this month and maintains that he intends to pitch until at least the age of 45, posted a 3.85 ERA in 29 starts for the Giants last year and was dominant in the second half after recovering from an early-season pec injury. He had a 2.60 ERA over his final 13 starts, 1.76 over his final six.
He joins a rotation that's headlined by two-time reigning AL Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal and Framber Valdez, who agreed to a three-year, $115 million deal with the Tigers last week. Jack Flaherty and Casey Mize will round out the top five, with Reese Olson, Drew Anderson and Troy Melton now all vying for jobs on the big-league staff.
Long criticized for being bargain shoppers under Chris Ilitch and president of baseball operations Scott Harris, the Tigers are now slated to spend more on their rotation this year -- close to $110 million -- than they did on their entire team in 2021. Their Opening Day payroll will rank among the 10 highest in the majors and push up against the luxury tax threshold of $244 million. They are playing and paying to win.
Verlander has left the door open to a return to Detroit since he was traded to the Astros at the 2017 deadline at the start of a long rebuild for the Tigers. He expressed interest in a reunion last winter, but he was coming off an injury-marred season in which he had a 5.48 ERA and was left off the Astros' postseason roster. The Tigers told him thanks but no thanks.
A year later, on the eve of pitchers and catchers reporting to Lakeland for the start of spring training, Verlander is back in the fold. For Verlander, it also marks a reunion with A.J. Hinch after they helped lead the Astros to a World Series title and two AL pennants over three years together in Houston.
Hinch likes to say that in the majors "everything matters," from small gains in an at-bat like winning the race to two strikes, to bigger ones in a season like consistently pounding the strike zone. On a grand scale, relationships matter most of all. A week after helping the Tigers seal the deal on Valdez through a personal meeting with a pitcher who broke into the big leagues under Hinch, he surely had a hand in bringing Verlander back to Detroit. Hinch, you could say, is on a heater.
Verlander has been delivering heaters for 20 years in the majors. He spent the first 13 of them with the Tigers, helping the club that once drafted him second overall win four division titles and two AL pennants. He has long lamented that they were unable to deliver a World Series title to late owner Mike Ilitch, who passed in 2017.
"It was one hell of a run," Verlander said in 2023 during a stop in Detroit with the Astros. "From the Cinderella story of 2006 through the year-in, year-out juggernauts and going deep into the playoffs every year, and Mr. I was doing anything he could to put an unbelievable product on the field, what a time to be not only a player for the Tigers, but a fan. You said the glory days. It felt like that as a player, too. It was just so fun to be a part of it."
Verlander returns to a team coming off two straight trips to the ALDS, with a chance to put the final flourish on his Hall of Fame career.