Tigers acquire outfielder Canha in trade with Brewers

DETROIT -- The Tigers’ first big move of the offseason is the kind of trade that president of baseball operations Scott Harris has hinted at for a while, leveraging their organizational pitching depth to address their offense. Detroit acquired veteran outfielder Mark Canha from Milwaukee on Saturday in exchange for relief prospect Blake Holub.

Canha, a nine-year veteran who also spent time with the A’s and Mets, fits the Tigers’ offensive profile, providing double-digit home run power while dominating the strike zone. He owns a .364 on-base percentage and a 120 OPS+ since 2018. He batted .262 this past season between New York and Milwaukee with 25 doubles, 11 home runs, 62 RBIs, a .355 on-base percentage and a 108 OPS+.

“Mark is an on-base machine,” Harris said on a conference call with reporters. “He goes up to the plate with a plan. He grinds out at-bats. He never gives in to pitchers. He makes a ton of contact. He’s been one of the biggest on-base threats in our game over the last four or five years. So I think he immediately makes us better.”

Canha is a little older compared to the rest of the Tigers’ roster; he’ll turn 35 in February. But the Tigers are hoping to use that experience as an advantage for the rest of their club.

“We feel really good about what he's going to add to our clubhouse,” Harris said. “It's no secret we're going to have a very young team next year. Adding Mark, who's a high-character guy who brings grit and toughness to our team, as a veteran who's seen a lot in this game, will only help our young guys adapt to the big leagues faster. I also think adding this type of bat with this caliber of approach at the plate can only help the young players. I hope many of our young hitters emulate this type of approach when they see it every day.”

In return, Canha allows the Tigers to address an offensive need without a long-term contract or testing a thin free-agent market. His contract has an $11.5 million club option for next season, which the Brewers appeared unlikely to pick up but the Tigers will.

The Tigers took advantage of the situation by acquiring him for Holub, a 15th-round Draft pick in 2021 who emerged as a relief prospect this year while helping Double-A Erie to its first-ever Eastern League title. The 6-foot-6 right-hander posted a 3.03 ERA and eight saves in 48 appearances between Erie and High-A West Michigan, striking out 76 batters over 65 1/3 innings. With two other big, hard-throwing right-handed relievers at the same level in Tyler Mattison and RJ Petit, the Tigers felt they had the depth to swing a deal.

“I didn’t want to trade Blake. He’s a talented young reliever who has a chance to pitch in a Major League bullpen in the future,” Harris said. “But in this game, you have to give up something to get something. I think that in this case, our player development group deserves a lot of credit here. They helped Blake take a huge step forward this year. [Vice president of player development] Ryan Garko and his staff helped him get in the zone, his stuff improved and he put together a really nice year that made him a valuable trade chip for us to go out and acquire Mark.”

The Tigers will plug Canha into a predominantly left-handed outfield group that includes Riley Greene, Kerry Carpenter, Parker Meadows and Akil Baddoo. Another left-handed-hitting outfielder, Austin Meadows, has one more year of team control but could be a non-tender candidate. The Canha trade could also allow Matt Vierling, another right-handed outfielder, to focus more on third base, where he played for a good stretch of the summer.

“I think it’s a little early in the offseason to truly forecast playing time. We have a lot of time left in the offseason to reshape our team,” Harris said. “I view my job as trying to make [manager A.J. Hinch’s] life more difficult, trying to make his decisions much more difficult. I think we made it more difficult today, and I intend to keep doing that and we’ll let A.J. put all the pieces together. He’s pretty good at that.”