Tigers: Everything A.J. Hinch said after benching Javy Baez

Detroit Tigers manager A.J. Hinch spoke out about his decision to bench star shortstop Javy Baez against the Blue Jays.

Ironically enough, the Tigers won their third game of the season on Thursday night against the Blue Jays in a contest that featured more off-field drama than anything which occurred on the diamond.

Javy Baez, the star shortstop who was signed to a six-year, $140 million contract just two offseasons ago, was benched for a brutal baserunning mistake. Baez forgot how many outs there were, and was thus doubled up on a line drive to center. Hinch, who has had enough of Detroit’s silly mistakes on the basepaths, decided to make an example out of Baez.

“If you watch the last couple of series, we’ve made a number of mental mistakes, and the one thing we can control is our preparedness and our readiness,” Hinch said, per ESPN. “It’s a message to our whole team that we’ve got to clean that up.”

Tigers: What AJ Hinch said about benching Javy Baez

AJ Hinch has the right idea here. While benching a star can come back to haunt a manager, Baez understands what’s expected of him on a daily basis. He’s a professional, and can come back from this.

“Obviously we’ve got to show respect to the game,” Baez said. “He took a decision and I respect that. He’s the manager and we’ve got to respect what he does.”

Baez’s initial comments were not as sound, as he suggested that the error occurred because he wasn’t in his usual spot in the lineup. That’s a tough break, considering Javy is hitting just .122 on the season with a .182 OBP and .328 OPS. He should consider himself lucky to have been in the lineup at all, let alone hitting sixth.

Nonetheless, the Tigers are off to a terrible start in 2023. Yesterday, they were 1-0. The rebuild starts now, one would hope.