By: Pat Caputo

When the Tigers traded Curtis Granderson to the Yankees, I could not have been more harsh in my criticism. I hated the trade.

Granderson was a third-round draft pick of the Tigers. He was just entering the prime years of his career. Although his batting average dropped in 2009, he still hit 30 home runs and made the American League All Star team. And they just handed him over to the Yankees…

The Tigers could only hope the main player they were getting back in the trade, the one replacing Granderson in center field, Austin Jackson, a minor league prospect at the time, would some day turn into a player remotely the caliber of Granderson.

Some fans agreed with me, but many fans loved the trade, not because of the players the Tigers were getting in return, whom they seemed to know little about, but just because they wanted Granderson run out of town. If it wasn’t because he couldn’t hit left-handers, it was because he suddenly wasn’t a good center fielder and a poor leadoff hitter. If it wasn’t because of those two issues, he was too active in the community and didn’t work hard enough on his game.

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