MLB: AJ Hinch confesses why Miguel Cabrera will play with the Tigers in 2023

Frederlin Castro

Miguel Cabrera was hitting around .300 in the first half of the season. Unfortunately, Cabrera was unable to maintain that trend and finished the season with a .254 average. In fact, in the second half of the season, Cabrera hit just .171 with two home runs and nine RBIs in 33 games.

AJ Hinch on the return of Miguel Cabrera in 2023

In an interview after the regular season ended, manager AJ Hinch explained why the organization decided to bring Miguel Cabrera back for the final year of his contract. “He has earned our respect”said AJ Hinch on the Stoney & Jansen Show.

MISSING ONE!

Miguel Cabrera reached 3⃣0⃣8⃣8⃣ hits and is one away from equaling Ichiro Suzuki😎⚾ï¸pic.twitter.com/SwV9i8d4sk

– Meridian (@MeridianoTV) October 5, 2022

“There’s definitely a balance that we have to find in what we can get from Miguel, Where are you physically, where can you contribute? So it’s up to us to make those tougher decisions based on the personnel we have,” Hinch said. “When I first met with Miguel when I got the job, I told him I was going to hit lower down the order. We have to build a team that has a means of order that can supply the damage that we need to justify that, just from a team standpoint.”

How will you use Miguel Cabrera in 2023?

Hinch knows Cabrera isn’t going to hit 40 (or even 30 or 20) home runs like he used to, but the goal is to squeeze as much as they can out of it.

2022 was legendary. 💠pic.twitter.com/0z4mVHcpnb

— MLB (@MLB) October 6, 2022

“Miguel doesn’t want to play like he did in the middle of the season, but no one was clamoring for him not to be part of the organization in the first half, when he made the All-Star team. Part of it was legacy, but we remember he was playing a lot fine,” Hinch said. “Maybe he’s not the 20, 30, 40 jersey guy, but we’re going to try to squeeze some more impact out of him and make decisions along the way that are associated with performance out of him.”