Nolan Arenado’s contract just isn’t a good fit for the Detroit Tigers

The offseason has been underway for five weeks already, and there has been near radio silence from the Detroit Tigers. This is the way Scott Harris likes it, and with good reason. On the other hand, the lack of rumors and signs of interest in the free agent market means that the few which have emerged may be getting more weight than they deserve. We have no idea if the Tigers are really serious about a trade for St. Louis Cardinals third baseman, Nolan Arenado, but the notion hasn’t gone away.

Just in the past week, Tigers’ beat writers Evan Petzold of the Free Press and Cody Stavenhagen of the Athletic have treated the rumor seriously on their respective podcasts. Katie Woo of the Athletic added a little extra detail in mentioning that Arenado would be open to playing first base if it helped his new club’s roster flexibility. Jon Morosi of MLB Network seized on that as a feature that would be attractive to the Tigers and pegged them as a fit for the veteran third baseman. There’s nothing to suggest a deal is in the works, but there is at least a hint of interest from the Tigers’ side.

There’s not even that much smoke there, let alone fire, but people with closer contacts to the Tigers seem to think this is at least a possibility. Frankly, trading for Nolan Arenado and then wasting most of his value by playing him at first base makes no sense, so we’re going to leave that aside for the most part.

If the Tigers trade for Arenado, it makes more sense to keep giving someone like Matt Vierling more reps at first base, and trying Justyn-Henry Malloy and Jace Jung, who each have solid hitting credentials as prospects but no real positional fit on the Tigers current roster, there this offseason. Most of Arenado’s remaining value as a player comes from his still excellent defense at the hot corner. There’s no point wasting that if you’re planning to trade for him, no matter what happens with Spencer Torkelson in 2025. Knowing Arenado is flexible about his position and will be a team player about it doesn’t hurt, but it isn’t a real feature either.

What does Arenado have left in the tank?

If this were a one-year move, reservations about adding Nolan Arenado to the Tigers would be pretty minor. Yes, they need a power-hitting right-handed bat, and he’s not likely to provide much in that regard at this stage of career beyond what Matt Vierling and the Tigers bench options could provide. However, they could use a regular third baseman, and the veteran remains one of the best defenders in the game at the hot corner.

Even in 2024, with his worst showing of his career at the plate, Arenado was still worth 3.1 fWAR with slightly above league average offensive production. He remains a gifted defender who can produce for a team defensively. Even owed $21 million in 2025, Arenado would be worth the whole amount if he just reproduced his 2024 production. And perhaps a move to a young, competitive team would be good for him after his disappointing stint with the Cardinals. At this point in his career he’s got to be hungry for another crack at the postseason.

Arenado hit .275 with 16 homers in 153 games in 2024. His walk rates have declined down to 6.9 percent in 2024, a few ticks off his prime years, but he still doesn’t strike out very much, posting a 14.5 percent K-rate last season. So he’s still putting the ball in play quite a bit and hitting for average. The power just isn’t what it used to be. The fact that Arenado has one of the longest swings in the game but with mediocre average batspeed, make one pretty wary of his future power production turning around from this point on, but he hasn’t fallen apart as a hitter yet either.

Arenado is still putting the ball in play a lot, and his sprint speed as well as his lack of injuries say he’s still pretty athletic and not failing physically at all. It’s just hard to imagine him holding up offensively over the next three seasons considering his sharp decline the past two years. Hand-eye coordination and batspeed are just very finely tuned attributes in which a small decline can really upend a hitters’ performance. He was coming from the level of an All-Star, so despite the decline he’s still an above average player for now, but the trajectory is not at all encouraging.

In 2024, Arenado posted the lowest barrel rate of his career by far, with a 3.2 percent mark. He had 7.3 percent barrels in 2023, 8.2 percent in 2022. Likewise, his 31.2 percent hard hit rate from Statcast was well off his career average of 37.6 percent, and down nearly seven percent from the 38.1 percent mark he posted in 2023. His fly ball rate has dropped off significantly the last two seasons as well, though of course that is reflected in the lack of barrels, but he’s just not hitting the ball hard as often too.

Nolan Arenado is well into his decline phase, and it’s entirely possible that his production will drop precipitously as soon as 2025.

Another issue with Arenado, is that he doesn’t hit lefties well, and that’s really what the Tigers need most in a bat. If he was a lefty crusher struggling to handle good right-handers as he enters his mid-30’s, the Tigers could work with that with pinch-hitters and some type of platoon. Instead, Arenado has posted a 74 wRC+ against lefties in 2023, and a 79 wRC+ in 2024 against southpaws. His marks against right-handers are still fairly good, with a 116 wRC+ in 2023 and a 110 wRC+ mark in 2023.

As a hitter, Matt Vierling is actually a better fit to play a big role at third base, with very balanced and above average splits. He too hit 16 homers in 2024, and posted a 108 wRC+ in 144 games. Of course, Vierling isn’t nearly the defender Arenado is at third base.

The Tigers would be taking a chance that Arenado, who turns 34 in April, would be able to stave off any further decline in 2025. That’s a reasonable gamble. Problem is, he’d also need to stave off that decline in his age 35 and 36 seasons as well since the Tigers would be taking on the whole contract. Sure, they could cut bait as needed in a year or two, but as we’ve already seen with Javy Báez, the Scott Harris-led Tigers’ front office is pretty loathe to eat guaranteed money even when the situation is screaming for them to do so.

Terms and conditions

The basic facts of the case are as follows. Nolan Arenado is owed $52 million over the next three years of the $255 million, eight-year contract extension he signed with the Colorado Rockies back in 2019. He holds a full no-trade clause, and so he has to be willing to come to the Tigers in the first place. Presumably that won’t be a problem, as the Cardinals are regrouping and going nowhere fast, but there’s at least the vague possibility that he could throw a monkey wrench into a proposed deal if he’s not enthused with the landing spot.

We’ll assume that the Tigers would expect the Cardinals pay a chunk of that remaining contract as well. They would then return a modest prospect package back to the Cardinals in exchange for getting a break on the money. Arenado is owed $21 million in 2025, $16 million in 2026, and $15 million in 2025. If the Cardinals took enough of the contract to make that something like $12-13 million each year for three years, that’s more palatable for the Tigers. Maybe that would make it easier to cut bait when things go south, as well.

On a one-year deal, it might be worth seeing if Arenado has another good year in him. At very least the Tigers would have an upgraded infield defense, and they could perhaps moderate some of his offensive weakness with A.J. Hinch’s typically aggressive pinch-hitting. Taking on three years of his contract, even at a discount, along with giving up some type of package of young players in return, just doesn’t really hold much appeal.

We certainly hope the Tigers have something bigger in store in terms of offensive additions. They’re going to need some really creative solutions if they’re serious about returning to the postseason and making a deeper push towards a World Series berth without doing something pretty bold. Trading for Arenado just doesn’t provide enough potential bang for the buck considering the risk involved.