Gardenhire Wants Injured Tigers To Stay Home
It's no secret the Tigers are banged up, Miguel Cabrera, Alex Wilson, Jeimer Candelario just to name a few. Right now all of those players are still travelling with the team on this current west coast swing. If Tigers manager Ron Gardenhire gets his way, that will no longer be the case.
Gardenhire has been a proponent of having players hang back on road trips if they have no chance of playing. Reports say Gardenhire spoke with John Westhoff, vice president, assistant general manager & general counsel, about the idea.
Gardenhire was quoted by the Detroit Free Press:
"We always felt they’re not as rushed as when they’re back home, by themselves, they get a little more anxiety when they’re home. They want to get better quickly. So that’s kind of one of the feelings. We thought they hated being away from the team. They didn’t get their meal money. No, they really did. But, stuff like that. We just thought, ‘Make them miserable. Send them to Florida in the heat.’ We did that to Jim Thome and he was back in a week.”
While there is no animosity on the surface, there could be some motivation behind this quote with regards to Miguel Cabrera, who has been on the disabled list since early May and has publicly said he is no longer playing hurt for lack of appreciation.