In an effort to find to bring a new angle to the routine nature of season previews, last year New English D ran a season preview series based on the team’s nine most pivotal players. We be called the series “2016 Bellwethers,” broke down the players whose 2016 direction would indicate where the Tigers were heading. Due to a solid response, the series is back for 2017. Keep in mind this is not a series about the most important Tigers, but rather the Tigers with the widest range of possible outcomes. You won’t see Miguel Cabrera featured, for example, because of his steady dominance of the league. Enjoy. | #9: James McCann and Alex Avila

I didn’t write that many words about the Tigers this offseason in part because I was often distracted by other things, but also in part because the Tigers didn’t really change very much. Most of the roster going into 2017 is the same as it was going into 2016. You don’t need offseason deep dives into players we all watched and analyzed during the season. No one needed another “something isn’t working right for Anibal Sanchez” article in November. I wrote them throughout the year and they didn’t help.

One exception to this trend was Victor Martinez, a player I explored at some length in December. In that piece I made two main points which I will reiterate here. If you want to see the graphics and such that support these points, follow the preceding link.

The first point is that your view of 2017 Victor Martinez is largely based on what you make of his 2015 season. Two years ago, he had a 78 wRC+ and was one of the least valuable players in baseball. In my piece, I argued that Martinez was probably so bad in 2015 because he had not fully healed from his knee surgery and was essentially one-legged player for most of that year. I think that point is largely defensible. If that’s the case, I wondered if it would make more sense to view Martinez as having simply missed 2015 entirely. My argument is that 2015 Martinez is not a reflection of Martinez’s abilities except for the fact that it tells you something about his injury risk. Yes, it’s quite possible Martinez has a serious leg injury. But if he doesn’t, his 2013, 2014, and 2016 numbers seem more instructive for 2017.

For that reason, I think we can be optimistic about Martinez and could count on his bat for a 120 wRC+ or so. However, I also noted in the piece that Martinez got into a bad habit in 2015 of swinging more often at pitches in the zone while also making less contact. That added to his strikeout rate and while his ability to strike the ball with authority came back in 2016, this bad habit remained, blunting some of his impact.

So going into 2017, we have to ask if Martinez will be healthy and if he will jettison his new found aggression in the zone. If he’s healthy and patient, he will hit. A productive Martinez would be a big boon for the Tigers, but without him in that capacity the club will suffer. There are plenty of good bats in the middle of the order, but the Tigers need to be better in 2017 than they were in 2016 and any steps back will cause problems.

It’s obvious that the club’s most fragile player is a bellwether, but he’s also a bellwether because his previous injury may have messed with his approach a bit and as he ages normally he will need every ounce of that patience in order to remain valuable.

I’m going to wind up saying it with every one of these posts, but the Tigers can be a relevant team if things go wrong but I don’t think they can be a real contend if anything substantial breaks in the other direction. Martinez’s knees foremost among them.