Comments on: Tigers sign Joaquin Benoit to three-year, $16.5 million deal

By: Ick McWang

Ick McWang — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 04:23:09 +0000

Rays fans will miss him. I liked the pickup from his early history w the Rangers, actually was intrigued by both ex Rangers we picked up, Hank Blalock and Benoit, but Benoit was great. He became a little bit more hittable at the end of the year, probably from being a bit tired as the guy hasn’t pitched a full season in years, but him and Soriano made Rays games a 7 inning game if we were in the lead.

Its a shame we didn’t have J.P. Howell all year, he really is what we were missing, especially in the playoffs, a lefty reliever who can go a couple innings if needed and is pretty much equal against lefties and righties.

By: flpunx

flpunx — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 02:17:20 +0000

Wow. Any chance the Rays bullpen had of returning strong again next year just took a huge hit. Partnered with the fact that Soriano is all but gone, we just lost our 2 biggest reliever assets.

By: The Rabbit

The Rabbit — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 16:42:50 +0000

“Had Zumaya and Mags not gotten hurt in 2010, their second half may have looked a lot different.”
That and if Brennan Boesch had not entirely forgotten how to hit over the 3-day All Star break, it could have been a lot tougher for the Twins.

By: cjvirnig

cjvirnig — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 16:23:56 +0000

Damn! As a Twins fan, I was really hoping Dombrowski would put all of his eggs back in the Joel Zumaya basket (just kidding). Zumaya has come close to single-handedly destroying the Tigers bullpen with his various injuries in each of the last three seasons, so it was almost inevitable that Dave Dombrowski would make a solid move to shore up that ‘pen. Benoit looks like a pretty good bet. Given that Detroit is far from done making deals this winter, they certainly look to have bypassed the White Sox as the Twins biggest threat in 2011. Had Zumaya and Mags not gotten hurt in 2010, their second half may have looked a lot different.

By: yankeesfanlen

yankeesfanlen — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 16:06:09 +0000

This should be good for the Tigers, maybe even get them competitive with the Twins if the rotation could stay healthy. Tigers CAN hit, just need less of a mish-mash of starters. Coke went through his maturing year in ’10, probably will make an excellent #3 or 4 man.