The greatest living Tigers? Kaline, Lolich, Verlander

This is limited to "Baseball's Greatest Living Players," so Ty Cobb isn't eligible.

But the Wall Street Journal compiled that list — the greatest hitter, pitcher and active player — for each of Major League Baseball's 30 franchises.

And you can't argue with the selections if you believe in enhanced statistics, because it's based on their WAR numbers at baseball-reference.com. Only the WAR (wins above replacement) for their time with each particular team was counted.

For the Detroit Tigers, no surprise, the greatest living hitter is Al Kaline, who hit .297 with 399 home runs in 22 seasons, all with the Tigers, for a WAR of 92.5.

Their greatest living pitcher is left-hander Mickey Lolich, who was 207-175 with a 3.45 ERA in 13 seasons for the Tigers, for a WAR of 47.5 (way above, say, Denny McLain's 23.0).

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And their greatest active player is ... Justin Verlander, who is 152-89 with a 3.53 ERA in 10 seasons for a WAR of 41.7.

If you're wondering, J.V. just edged out Miguel Cabrera, who has a WAR of 41.2 for his seven seasons with the Tigers.

Two current Tigers also made the list for other teams: Opening Day winner David Price is the Tampa Bay Rays' greatest living pitcher and second baseman Ian Kinsler is the Texas Rangers' greatest active player.

It's also notable that statistics don't count the other stuff, so the list also includes names such as Pete Rose, Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens and Alex Rodriguez.

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Contact Steve Schrader: sschrader@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @schradz.