Justin Verlander’s Retirement Announcement might be the Spark the Tigers Needed

DETROIT – Sometimes in the sport of baseball you will see a manager purposely try to get an umpire to eject them from a game in hopes of lighting a fire underneath his players who are likely underperforming.

Back in May, the Tigers needed a forest-fire’s worth of manager ejections to get them out of the funk that saw them record an MLB worst 6-22 record and just 81 total hits.

Now in July, this team has been busy, not just on the field, but off of it too. On Tuesday (July 7th), A.J. Hinch announced to the media the mutual parting of ways with third base coach, Joey Cora. The following day, Justin Verlander sat in the very same press room to express his intention of retiring from professional baseball at the end of this season. The news came just hours before the Tigers defeated the Athletics 6-1 for their seventh win in the last eight games played.

It’s crazy to think about how much the perception of Detroit baseball has changed in the five months since Verlander originally signed a one-year contract worth $13 million. Framber Valdez joined the club just days prior and the arrival of the three-time Cy Young winner, also known as ‘Must-See JV’, pretty much confirmed President of Baseball Operations, Scott Harris, had his eyes on a very large prize for 2026.

Fast forward to mid-summer and the Tigers are trying to dig themselves out of a hole that Verlander didn’t necessarily put them in.

“I came back here with the intention of being a part of a great run of a playoff-caliber team, and to hopefully do something special,” said the two-time World Series champion. ”That hasn’t changed, its just become harder.”

Despite being on the outside of the Wild Card chase in the American League, the vibes have been positive for the most part. Since June 1st, the Tigers have strung together three different four-game winning streaks and lead all of the majors with a 3.17 team ERA.

Believe it or not they even lead MLB with 55 home runs over that time frame. Justin Verlander might not contribute to that part of the game, but he too is optimistic about him and his team being able to keep things trending upward.

“Baseball has a funny way of righting the ship and turning things around. As much bad luck as you run into, sometimes you run into good luck. That’s the beautiful thing about playing 162 games, there’s a lot of time.”

At the time of this writing, and with less than a week before the annual All-Star game break, the Tigers sit 5.5 games out of the A.L. Central division lead and 4.5 games out of the final Wild Card spot. 66 games will remain on his teams schedule when they and the rest of MLB return from Philadelphia. Verlander sees that as a plus rather than a concern.

“Sometimes it feels like time isn’t in your favor, but when start off the way we did, and I think everybody in that locker room understands our potential, then you’re like ‘okay I’m glad we’re playing this many games, like we still have time to right the ship and play the way we know we can,’ and that’s what you’re seeing more of recently.”

Especially now that his career has been given an end date, Verlander shouldn’t bat an eye during the upcoming trade deadline, but a fellow starting pitcher should. Tarik Skubal is healthy and back to contributing to Tigers victories, something he hopes Scott Harris will take into account when mulling over what changes to make with the roster.

“There has to be a sense of urgency, I think, but it’s not like we’re panicking, we just need to win baseball games,” said Skubal on Wednesday. “We obviously put ourselves in the spot that we’re in, but the faith and belief in this team has never changed and it never will and hopefully come decision time the people making those decisions understand that.”

The reigning Cy Young winner made it known how much he valued Verlander’s decision to retire by actually attending his press conference and even making himself available for questions afterwards, which is what produced the quote from above.

A lot of reflection and introspection has taken place in the clubhouse over the last couple of days, but manager A.J. Hinch has always said his players will fight through all 27 outs no matter the circumstances, and he echoed that same sentiment on Wednesday night.

“We have a tough team, we’re going through a lot,” said Hinch after his team’s series win against the Athletics. “Whether it’s the beginning of the season, to the conversation around our team for a few months now and then obviously this homestand, but our guys play the game. I appreciate the resiliency of this group and we’re just going to continue to put one foot in front of the other.”

It was around this time two years ago baseball fans in Detroit were unsatisfied with the direction of a team that ended up making a miraculous run at the ALDS. About one year ago during this time Tigers fans were thinking about their first division title since 2013, just to see it slip away. Just like we were all thinking different thoughts about this team in February than we are now, don’t be surprised if they revert back by the time the calendar turns to September.