Tigers will pursue two starting pitchers in off-season

It was the obvious answer, so Al Avila got it out of the way.

At the tail end of his opening statements before a season-ending luncheon with reporters this afternoon at Comerica Park, the Detroit Tigers’ vice president and general manager outlined his approach to the off-season, saying simply, “Our biggest need going into the off-season is pitching.”

Avila said the team will aggressively pursue two starting pitchers this winter, “Different levels of starting pitching that will be dependent on how the market unfolds and what’s available,” and admitted that the hope is to land a front-line pitcher – a top-three rotation arm – in either free agency or a trade.

“I think two starting pitchers added to that rotation will bring down some of these guys that we don’t want to force feed and we want right there in Triple-A and it will give us some of the depth that we need,” he said.

It is a robust starting pitcher market this off-season, led by former Tiger left-hander David Price, who was dealt to the Toronto Blue Jays at the trade deadline, and could include a handful of front-line arms such as right-handers Zack Greinke and Johnny Cueto and second-tier arms such as right-handers Jordan Zimmermann and Jeff Samardzija.

Samardzija, who is coming off a down season with the White Sox – he posted a 4.96 ERA with 163 strikeouts in 214 innings – seems the most likely target to help patch the holes that contributed to the team's first-to-worst fall in the American League Central.

Avila wouldn’t dismiss their chances at one of the available aces, but the organization’s actions over the past year speak louder than those words. Last off-season, they were not in the running to retain right-hander Max Scherzer’s services before he signed a seven-year, $210 million deal with the Nationals.

This season, they traded Price, who is expected to get a contract close to Scherzer’s, and former president and general manager Dave Dombrowski said at the time that contract extension talks with Price’s camp had never progressed to a serious point because of the difference in dollars.

About the team’s payroll, which was around $175 million in 2015, Avila said that in talking with longtime team owner Mike Ilitch, the Tigers would field a team with a “very highly competitive payroll, like we always have.”

Addressing the off-season in our Talkin' Tigers podcast

He wouldn’t elaborate on whether the payroll for the upcoming season would be higher or lower, but said a payroll in the $189-200 million range was “ridiculous.”

But the starting rotation only represents one half of the team’s porous pitching in 2015 – the Tigers finished last in the American League with a 4.64 ERA – and said another priority would be adding at least a couple of bullpen arms and specifically, a closer.

“The bullpen needs to be addressed,” Avila said. “That’s going to be a key.”

He classified the team’s search for a closer as a “tough task,” citing the lack of options on the free agent market – former Tiger Joakim Soria, also traded this season, is the only proven choice – and wouldn’t rule out acquiring an arm via trade or approaching pitchers that lack a lengthy track record.

“These are areas we’re going to be experimenting and exploring with the use of analytics and scouts,” he said. “Can we come up with a couple names that have the potential to be closers? That’s really one area where it’s going to be very important because sitting here today, I don’t know that there’s an absolute closer right there that we’re locked in on. So we really have to explore every avenue.”

Avila touched on a couple of internal options, saying he hoped right-handed reliever Bruce Rondon, who was dismissed from the team for “effort level” reasons late in the season, has learned his lesson.

“I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the lesson is learned, and he comes back ready to go,” Avila said.

He threw arbitration-eligible right-hander Neftali Feliz into the mix but with a $4.12 million contract last season, his return seems unlikely.

Avila said the team’s off-season talks have already started; externally with a couple of teams to gauge the trade market and internally about a contract extension for rightfielder J.D. Martinez. He characterized a split with son Alex Avila as “probable,” saying he felt the longtime Tigers’ catcher would find a better suitor on the free agent market, and sent this message to the rest of the league:

“We’re open for business in the sense that if anything makes sense for us in a trade, we would do it,” he said. “It’s not like everybody is set in stone.”

But what is set in stone is the team’s plans to pursue a pitching upgrade.

Where they will find the pitching – on the free agent market or through a trade – and how much they will have to spend to get it remains unknown.

“That would probably help us,” he said.

It is the obvious answer.

Contact Anthony Fenech: afenech@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @anthonyfenech.

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Key dates

Oct. 13: Arizona Fall League begins.

Five days after World Series: Free agency begins.

Nov. 9-12: GM meetings in Boca Raton, Fla.

Dec. 7-10: Winter meetings in Nashville, Tenn.

Jan. 12: Salary arbitration filing.

Jan. 15: Salaryarbitration figures exchanged.