First of two posts on Curtis Granderson. One from the Detroit POV; the other from the Yankees’ POV.

Baseball teams are businesses.  Unstable revenue streams cannot support massive expenditure indefinitely.  The Tigers’ bubble was bound to blow at some moment.  With the team now shopping Curtis Granderson, that moment has come.

Granderson is a great fielder with speed and power.  He’s likable.  He’s locked up through his prime until 2012 for a reasonable $23.75 million.  Detroit has a fair $13 million option for 2013.  Granderson’s the exact player teams don’t want to trade.  So, why are the Tigers’ shopping him?  Ask Dave Dombrowski.

Detroit’s economy is terrible, but even in more opportune times, it’s not Boston or New York.  The Tigers don’t draw substantial attendance when the team is not good.  I have fond pre-2006 recollections of parking in the free lot for a weeknight game, sitting in my own section behind home plate and griping because the Tigers didn’t bother to open the hot dog stands on the upper level.

The Tigers are a top-five spending team.  They aren’t a top-five earning team.  The Red Sox and Yankees can afford to swing and miss on a contract.  The Tigers’ can’t.  Despite this reality, Dave Dombrowski has been hacking indiscriminately with backloaded contracts.  He’s the GM version of Jeff Francoeur.

Dombrowski has said the Tigers aren’t having a fire sale.  They can’t have a fire sale, because their contracts are so bad no one will take them.

Detroit pays Carlos Guillen’s desiccated husk $26 million the next two seasons.  Dontrelle Willis had his contract extended before throwing a pitch in spring training, $12 million.  Jeremy Bonderman has never panned out, $12.5 million.  Nate Robertson, not a certainty to make the major league roster, $10 million.

The Tigers allowed Magglio Ordonez to gurantee his $18 million option for next season.  He can conceivably earn himself a $15 million option for 2011 as well.

Dombrowski has committed $65.5 million next year to five players who could be dead weight.  In coming seasons, that amount could be a sensible payroll for the Tigers.  If you add Miguel Cabrera’s $20 million, that is $85.5 million for six players.  That would leave them just $30 million to pay the rest of the team, and that’s assuming they maintain the same payroll.  The only recourse is to trade whomever they can to clear money, which happens to be Curtis Granderson.

The Tigers are shedding productive, reasonably priced players to subsidize atrocious backloaded contracts given to veterans.  That’s not a recipe for success.