Lynn Henning

Tigers' lack of hitting sealed their fate long ago

Watching the innings pass and fate arrive Tuesday night at the Metrodome, it was so clear, right through their final game, what would likely undo manager Jim Leyland's team in its playoff showdown against the Minnesota Twins and lead to a long offseason of reflection and reconstruction.

An otherwise solidly built baseball team has too few hitters.

It was the 2009 Tigers' epitaph. It was written early this season and from week to week was never overshadowed or overwhelmed by any other flaw.

Losing in such crushing fashion Tuesday, 6-5, in 12 innings to the Twins at a miserable mausoleum known as the Metrodome, will spur the Tigers to make changes for 2010 that must be made if the Tigers are to avoid the frustration and ultimate failure that sent them home Tuesday night, rather than on to New York for a playoff series against the Yankees.

The Tigers have the pitching. They had it again Tuesday night in the person of a magnificent 20-year-old craftsman named Rick Porcello.

They have it in Justin Verlander and Edwin Jackson. They have it in their bullpen, although two of their prime-time soldiers there, Brandon Lyon and Fernando Rodney, look as if they will be lost to free agency.

They have infield defense on a celestial level, as they do at catcher.

But they don't have the bats.

Twins show the way

Magglio Ordonez's renaissance down the stretch, which included a heroic home run Tuesday, gives the Tigers a measure of hope in 2010 if he can sustain at age 36 what he showed from September into October.

Miguel Cabrera could be to the Tigers next season and beyond what Joe Mauer is to the Twins: a batting champion and Most Valuable Player shoo-in. But he will need first of all to get a handle on himself and his alcohol challenges, which led to a disgraceful weekend binge that will carry scars and ominous overtones until Cabrera proves he has command of his life.

The Twins showed in September as they ultimately displayed Tuesday that pitching and defense can keep you in contention, but a fence-busting offense is just as necessary.

The Twins went 17-4 in their final 21 games all because their bats matched the rest of their quality components. They had Mauer, Jason Kubel, Michael Cuddyer, Delmon Young, and all those other pesky, speedy Twins ignition switches.

They also were playing minus Justin Morneau, a former MVP, who you can bet might have ended Tuesday's game well before the 12th inning.

They need muscle

In the end, manager Ron Gardenhire's team one-upped the Tigers because the Twins had big-league offense figured out.

The Tigers couldn't answer.

How the Tigers add muscle to their lineup ahead of 2010 will be a sticky assignment for Dave Dombrowski, the Tigers president and general manager. He'll be fighting a two-front battle to repair his bullpen, should Lyon and Rodney both depart, while at the same time working to add a hefty hitter or two.

And he'll do this without any blank checks. The Tigers probably have some wiggle room, thanks to owner Mike Ilitch, who seems always to finance acquisitions that make sense to him and to his front office.

But with a $100-million-plus payroll already guaranteed for 2010 it won't be an easy patch-up job for Dave Dombrowski, the Tigers president and general manager.

Worth discussing is whether the Tigers may need to alter somewhat their drafting and development philosophy.

They have now traded 14 pitching prospects during the past three years, largely because they were trying to add position talent they tend to draft as a secondary priority to pitching.

Is this approach working?

Note that the Twins' big hitters are all homegrown: Mauer, Morneau, Kubel, and Cuddyer.

The Tigers' middle-of-the-order thunder, or what passes for it -- Ordonez, Cabrera, Guillen -- were either signed as free agents or were grabbed in trades. Granted, the Tigers got 57 home runs in 2009 from Curtis Granderson and Brandon Inge, both of whom are Tigers draft products.

But neither Granderson nor Inge ranks as a middle-of-the-order hammer that a championship team needs and that the Twins used so regularly and so mightily to finally win a division waiting to be claimed.

The Twins have been able to develop a steady stream of pitchers, as well. Signing and producing relatively inexpensive talent on all levels has been at the heart of their tenure as one of baseball's best organizations.

The Tigers aren't slackers here, by any means. They have another wave of power pitchers incubating in the minors and they have three interesting outfield prospects in Ryan Strieby, Brennan Boesch, and Casper Wells. Any of that trio could crash Leyland's lineup at some point in 2010.

But it will likely be 2011 before the outfielders are heard from in any kind of game-breaking ways, and it could be just as long before Leyland's infield gets the organizational help it needs.

Pitching and defense will get you far in baseball. It got the Tigers a five-month ride in first place.

But in the end the Tigers lacked championship balance. The Twins had an ounce more of it.

The Tigers will get busy today trying to tip the scales in Motown's favor, pleasing all those fans who Tuesday night had their hearts smashed by those marvelous but maddening Minnesota Twins.

lynn.henning@detnews.com