Detroit Tigers Clips Tuesday, February 16, 2016
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Detroit Tigers Clips Tuesday, February 16, 2016 Detroit Free Press Tigers' VerHagen pumped to repeat success from 2015 (Fenech) Tigers' Krizan tries to rebound from underwhelming 2015 (Fenech) The Detroit News Rigorous workouts have Sanchez primed for strong comeback (McCosky) Top 10 Tigers spring training story lines (McCosky) MLB.com Maybin looking to win Tigers' center-field spot (Beck) Oakland Press Pat Caputo - Detroit Tigers pitching should be much better, but there is hardly any guarantee (Caputo) Daily Transactions 1 Tigers' VerHagen pumped to repeat success from 2015 February 16, 2016 By Anthony Fenech/ Detroit Free Press LAKELAND, Fla. – This time last year, Drew VerHagen was a starting pitcher. His back wasn’t fully healthy, he didn’t consistently throw in the mid-90 m.p.h. range and he hadn’t yet experienced success at the big league level. But after a season with stops on the disabled list, at Triple-A Toledo and Double-A Erie and then out of the Detroit Tigers’ bullpen, the right-hander is ready to put pen over his name, which is penciled into a long relief role in the bullpen. “I feel great,” he said. “I feel strong, I feel healthy, and I feel way better than I did at this time last year.” VerHagen, 25, enters spring training looking to build off the momentum he finished last season with. In his second stint as a reliever, he posted a 1.42 ERA in 19 appearances, limiting opponents to a .195 batting average in that time. “That was a great way to go into the off-season,” he said. “I feel confident throwing out of the bullpen. I like throwing out of the bullpen, I always have. Getting those consistent opportunities up here last year definitely changes your mindset a little bit.” VerHagen was sidelined out of spring training last year with a back injury, at which point the organization decided to transition him into a relief role. He came up in a pinch on July 5, walked four batters in an inning, went back down to the minor leagues and re- emerged a month and a half later, looking like a different pitcher, with more velocity in short stints. “The arm strength is there, my body is there, now it’s basically refining and working some rust off,” he said. “I feel like I could throw in a game this week.” When he does, a major point of emphasis will be the development of his changeup, to go with a two-seam fastball, four-seam fastball and curveball. “That’s definitely a goal I set for this year, to throw the changeup a lot more,” he said. “To go into both sides of the plate against right-handers and left-handers.” He is four bullpen sessions into his spring, scratching the itch that comes every year around New Year’s Day. ““Once January hits, you feel like it’s pretty much right around the corner,” he said. “That’s when I really got into it but coming down here and seeing all the guys, that’s when I get really excited.” 2 Tigers' Krizan tries to rebound from underwhelming 2015 February 16, 2016 By Anthony Fenech/ Detroit Free Press LAKELAND, Fla. – It’s one of Jason Krizan’s true beliefs in baseball. “What happens on the field, happens on the field,” he said on Monday. “And what happens at the plate, happens at the plate.” And when bad things were happening on the field last season, they were happening at the plate, too. The Tigers’ prospect – an outfielder by trade, a second baseman at times – didn’t put much stock into those two things being related in an underwhelming season in the minor leagues, but it couldn’t have helped he was in his first year on the job at second base. After a strong spring opened eyes within the organization, Krizan, 26, hit .252 between Triple-A Toledo and Double-A Erie. He was stuck in no man’s land with the Mud Hens (Toledo), asked to change up his swing but feeling like it didn’t help, and when he returned to the outfield with the SeaWolves, hit .300 over the second half. “I haven’t really struggled, so it was definitely new to me and definitely a learning experience,” he said. “It was real tough. I had some doubts but I also had the confidence in myself that I knew I was going to get out of it so it was just a matter of time.” Krizan spent his first morning at the team’s spring training facilities hitting in the batting cages and taking ground balls at second base, and after persevering through 2015, is looking forward to his second big-league camp as a more experienced player. “I think last year, I came in not really knowing what was going on and at first, it was kind of an overwhelming feeling,” he said. “But once I got my feet settled in, I was a lot more comfortable. This year, I’m just coming in to try and win a job, which is definitely different than last year.” 3 Rigorous workouts have Sanchez primed for strong comeback February 16, 2016 By Chris McCosky/ The Detroit News Lakeland, Fla. – The concept of an X-factor is thrown around too liberally in sports. But when you look at the Tigers, at least as things look three days before pitchers and catchers report to spring training, it’s difficult not to see Anibal Sanchez as the fulcrum of the starting rotation. The Tigers paid good money ($290 million) to feel good about the top of their rotation – Justin Verlander and Jordan Zimmermann. They are willing to roll the dice on the back end with a gritty veteran (Mike Pelfrey) and a promising young left-hander (Daniel Norris). Sanchez, 32 and coming off the most befuddling season of his career, stands smack in the middle. And it doesn’t take much imagination to see how different this rotation would look with a healthy and productive Sanchez, vintage 2013, as opposed to the 2015 version. Sanchez, who worked out Monday morning with a group of about 12 pitchers, feels the same way. “Yeah, I do,” he said. “Last year wasn’t – no matter how good I feel before a start, everything don’t come out good. One game I gave up like five hits and three of them were homers. It was incredible. One game I strike out 11, but I give up two homers. “This year is totally different. I don’t want to think about anything that happened last year, but I am going to use it to make me strong mentally.” Sanchez, just two years removed from posting a league-best 2.57 ERA with 202 strikeouts, was 10-10 last season with a 4.99 ERA and 1.28 WHIP. He gave up a league- and career-high 29 home runs in 157 innings. Curiously, there was no drastic loss of velocity. There was no pitch in his vast arsenal that he had to scrap. Until August, Sanchez’s struggles were a mystery to the club and himself. The mystery was cleared up when Sanchez announced he’d been trying to work through some pain and soreness in his right shoulder. He was diagnosed with a rotator cuff strain and shut down after not making it out of the third inning on Aug. 18. “I had a couple of parts on my body that were sore and I started dropping my arm on the side,” he said. “The pitches I threw with up and down movement went side to side. At the end, they were making contact on every pitch I threw because nothing was dropping down.” According to BrooksBaseball.com, opponents hit .292 off Sanchez’s four-seam fastball and, alarmingly, .278 off his flat slider. In 2013, opponents hit .224 off his fastball and .162 off his slider. Clearly, losing his sinking action was a major culprit. Sanchez did not require surgery on his shoulder, nor did he need any extensive rehab. Rest was the prescription for the shoulder – but not for the rest of his body. While he didn’t pick up a baseball for three and a half months, he put the rest of his body, particularly his legs, through holy hell. “I did a lot of good stuff in the offseason,” he said. “Treatment on the whole body, working to reduce the tightness in places on my body. My conditioning was amazing. The plan I picked this offseason was really good.” For the past five months, Sanchez has worked out six days a week. On five of those days, he said, he focused on his legs. “The upper-body exercises were complementary to the leg work,” he said. What he has learned, from doctors and trainers, is that his shoulder is strong, structurally and otherwise. It’s all the attending parts of the body that contribute to throwing a baseball that needed work. “It’s more that it was too tight,” he said of his shoulder. “All the exercises I’ve been doing now, they make me strong and loose. Before I would work so hard on my shoulders and back, my whole upper body, and when I throw in tense situations, that’s when I’d get ligament pulls and strains and things like that. “This offseason, I work legs, glute and core, and that’s helped me take a lot of pressure off my arm.” He began his throwing program on Dec.