Comparing the Yankee-4 with the Tiger-5

Have you seen the newest Sport's Illustrated cover? It's a picture of the four "core Yankees" of the past 15 years (Derek Jeter, Mariano Rivera, Jorge Posada, and Andy Pettitte). Personally, I feel it's a bit, errr, "feminine"? Looking at it makes me uncomfortable.

But it does make me think about what the Tigers of the late 80s and early 90s could have been if Tiger management would have been willing to:

• Shell out the cash to keep players around (which the Yanks have done)
  
• Shell out the cash to surround their core with big name role players (the list for NY is long!)

Consider this. In the late 70s, the Tigers had not 4, but 5 cornerstone-type players break into the bigs (Lou Whitaker, Alan Trammell, Jack Morris, Kirk Gibson, and Lance Parrish). While I recognize that sadly none of these will be in the Hall of Fame (and probably 2 of the 4 Yankees will), I think these five, as a group, compare quite nicely with the Yankee 4.




Whitaker was a rookie of the year. Trammell was a league MVP runner-up (really should have won it). They manned the middle of the infield together longer than any other combination, and both of them put up career numbers that are in the top 5 for their position in their era. Lance Parrish was an all-star EIGHT times and hit over 300 HR in his career.

Gibson probably underachieved most of his career (partly due to injury), but after he left the Tigers, he did win an NL MVP one season and hit what is arguably the greatest home run in the history of baseball.

Jack Morris was the greatest of the bunch. He won more games than ANY other pitcher in the 1980s. He was a five time all-star. He won FOUR world-series rings, and he had one of the all-time greatest world series pitching performances in 1991, throwing 10 INNINGS of shut-out ball to clinch game 7 and the World Series MVP award.

So here's how I score the comparison:

Jeter > Trammell (not sure how the numbers compare, but I think most people would agree)
Pettitte < Morris (for those who never saw Jack pitch, this might be tough to believe, but it's right)
Posada < Parrish (Check the numbers, it's really not even close!)
Rivera vs. Whitaker/Gibson (kind of a wash... hard to compare different players, although Rivera's greatness is undeniable)

Here's the conclusion. These four Yankees have been great, but clearly the Tiger core of the 80s was at worst comparable, and at best better... If only the Dominoes guy had been as willing to spend money as the Little Ceasar's guy, we might have seen 3-5 World Series in TigerTown...