DETROIT \u2013 The Detroit Tigers made a surprising move this week, just days before they\u2019re scheduled to open the 2026 season against the San Diego Padres.<\/p>\n
On Monday, March 23, 2026, the Tigers signed right-hander Connor Seabold to a deal worth $800,000. That\u2019s not overly surprising — the Tigers love to tinker with pitching castoffs.<\/p>\n
What\u2019s surprising is that the Tigers have already told Seabold he\u2019ll make the Opening Day roster. Even though the surface stats don\u2019t justify it.<\/p>\n
Bullpen battles<\/p>\n
The final few Tigers bullpen spots aren\u2019t locked down, by any means. Beyond the five locks — Will Vest, Kenley Jansen, Kyle Finnegan, Tyler Holton, and Drew Anderson — three spots were fully up for grabs.<\/p>\n
Brenan Hanifee entered spring as a favorite to make the roster, on paper, but his struggles against lefties and some ugly spring numbers have left that spot up in the air.<\/p>\n
Brant Hurter is likely to give the Tigers a second left-hander alongside Holton, but will Enmanuel De Jesus be a third? He\u2019s tossed nine innings this spring with 10 strikeouts and no earned runs. That doesn\u2019t even include his excellent 7.1 innings (three hits, one run, one walk, and 11 strikeouts) for World Baseball Classic champion Venezuela earlier in the month.<\/p>\n
Burch Smith is also having a nice spring, with nine strikeouts and two earned runs allowed across 7.2 innings.<\/p>\n
So while Hanifee, Hurter, De Jesus, and Smith aren\u2019t locks, they are decent options. So if the Tigers brought someone else in at the 11th hour and gave him a job, he must be tearing it up this spring, right?<\/p>\n
Wrong.<\/p>\n
Connor Seabold\u2019s numbers<\/p>\n
Seabold was released by the Blue Jays over the weekend after allowing five earned runs, seven hits, and four walks across 6.2 spring innings.<\/p>\n
His 6.75 ERA and 1.65 WHIP fall in line with his career MLB numbers — a 7.79 ERA and 1.765 WHIP in 119 innings (19 starts and 21 relief appearances from 2021-2025).<\/p>\n
Seabold wasn\u2019t very good in the minors last season, either, posting a 6.07 ERA and 1.421 WHIP in Triple-A. His 444 career minor-league innings have yielded a 4.16 ERA and 1.189 WHIP.<\/p>\n
Other than a solid 2024 season in Korea — a 3.43 ERA and 1.094 WHIP in 28 starts, including 158 strikeouts in 160 innings — Seabold hasn\u2019t experienced much success since dominating college ball at Cal State Fullerton from 2015-2017.<\/p>\n
Why Tigers are giving him a chance<\/p>\n
So why, then, did the Tigers decide to not only add Seabold this late in the spring, but also give him a roster spot over someone who\u2019s been fighting for it the past month?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s simple: They think he can miss bats.<\/p>\n
As good as the Tigers feel about the back end of their bullpen, the lack of swing-and-miss has been a real problem over the past two seasons.<\/p>\n
In 2025, here\u2019s how the top three Tigers leverage relievers performed relative to the rest of the league in strikeout rate and whiff rate:<\/p>\n
Tyler Holton: 33rd percentile K%, 44th percentile Whiff%<\/p>\n
Kyle Finnegan: 59th percentile K%, 44th percentile Whiff%<\/p>\n
Will Vest: 78th percentile K%, 61st percentile Whiff%<\/p>\n
Jansen brings a 63rd percentile strikeout rate and 54th percentile whiff rate to the bullpen. Like the other three, those numbers aren\u2019t bad. But the Tigers lack a truly dynamic swing-and-miss arm for key spots in late innings.<\/p>\n
Can Seabold be that? It\u2019s a long shot, but I see why the Tigers are willing to give him a try.<\/p>\n
Spring training whiffs<\/p>\n
This spring, Seabold is throwing his four-seam fastball noticeably harder than the 92.4 mph it averaged in 2025. In four of his six spring outings for Toronto, he averaged at least 94 mph.<\/p>\n
As a result, the stuff overall is more explosive. In those six appearances for the Blue Jays, Seabold induced 29 whiffs on 62 swings from hitters — a ridiculous 46.8% whiff rate.<\/p>\n
Most notably, Seabold has gotten 13 whiffs on 28 swings with his four-seamer. That alone is a good enough reason to give him a second look.<\/p>\n
For most of his career, Seabold has used a four-seam\/slider\/changeup mix. But during the spring, he\u2019s shown an ability to miss bats with four different pitches:<\/p>\n
13 whiffs on the four-seam fastball<\/p>\n
Seven whiffs on the sweeper<\/p>\n
Five whiffs on the slider<\/p>\n
Four whiffs on the changeup<\/p>\n
If Seabold can get major-league hitters to swing through his fastball and also miss bats with even one secondary pitch, he\u2019s got the makings of a legitimate bullpen weapon. The question is whether the Tigers can get that out of him.<\/p>\n
Considering the rehab jobs they did with Vest and Holton, as well as the improvement from Finnegan after the trade deadline last season, they have as good a chance as anyone.<\/p>\n
Who was he facing?<\/p>\n
Spring training stats deserve heavy skepticism, especially in a small sample size like this one. But the fact that we can point to the velocity bump as a possible explanation for Seabold\u2019s whiff rate gives it a little more credibility.<\/p>\n
Another important piece of context: Is he facing MLB hitters, or minor leaguers who enter late in spring training games without names on the backs of their jerseys?<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s your answer.<\/p>\n
Feb. 22 vs. Red Sox:<\/p>\n
Nick Sogard<\/p>\n
Mikey Romero<\/p>\n
Tsung-Che Cheng<\/p>\n
Braiden Ward<\/p>\n
Tyler McDonough<\/p>\n
Feb. 28 vs. Phillies:<\/p>\n
Bryan De La Cruz<\/p>\n
Liover Peguero<\/p>\n
Carson DeMartini<\/p>\n
Justin Crawford<\/p>\n
Kyle Schwarber<\/p>\n
Bryce Harper<\/p>\n
Edmundo Sosa<\/p>\n
Garrett Stubbs<\/p>\n
Otto Kemp<\/p>\n
Bryan De La Cruz<\/p>\n
March 7 vs. Phillies:<\/p>\n
Cade Fergus<\/p>\n
Bryan De La Cruz<\/p>\n
Erick Brito<\/p>\n
Christian Cairo<\/p>\n
March 10 vs. Braves: <\/p>\n
Eric Hartman<\/p>\n
Jair Camargo<\/p>\n
Colby Jones<\/p>\n
Jordan Groshans<\/p>\n
March 13 vs. Twins:<\/p>\n
James Outman<\/p>\n
Ryan Kreidler<\/p>\n
Tristan Gray<\/p>\n
Gio Urshela<\/p>\n
March 16 vs. Marlins:<\/p>\n
Xavier Edwards<\/p>\n
Otto Lopez<\/p>\n
Liam Hicks<\/p>\n
Connor Norby<\/p>\n
Griffin Conine<\/p>\n
Esteury Ruiz<\/p>\n
There aren\u2019t many established hitters on this list — Harper and Schwarber are the only stars, and Outman, Edwards, Lopez, Hicks, and Norby have shown promise, at times.<\/p>\n
So while the strikeout numbers are excellent, the level of competition has to be taken into account. And let\u2019s not forget: Seabold posted a 6.75 ERA and 1.65 WHIP against these hitters.<\/p>\n
The Tigers are essentially throwing a Hail Mary on Seabold and hoping to harness that swing-and-miss potential he\u2019s suddenly showing.<\/p>\n
Again, it\u2019s a long shot. But if anyone can do it, it\u2019s Chris Fetter and the Tigers.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WDIV ClickOnDetroit – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DETROIT \u2013 The Detroit Tigers made a surprising move this week, just days before they\u2019re scheduled to open…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":642386,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2386],"tags":[58599,5,147,53,2583,4,594],"class_list":{"0":"post-642385","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-tigers","8":"tag-2026-detroit-tigers","9":"tag-baseball","10":"tag-detroit","11":"tag-detroit-tigers","12":"tag-detroittigers","13":"tag-mlb","14":"tag-tigers"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116289385857209189","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642385","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=642385"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/642385\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/642386"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=642385"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=642385"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=642385"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}