Make no mistake, Detroit Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris has been thinking about center fielder Riley Greene — a budding star and arguably the future of the franchise — this offseason.
Harris had Greene, the 2019 No. 5 overall pick, on his mind throughout the evaluation process for changes to the outfield dimensions at Comerica Park, specifically when conversations about the height of the walls were taking place.
One of the goals is to create more exciting defensive plays for fans (and for Greene).
“The wall height and Riley Greene are related,” Harris said Jan. 11. “He’s pretty good at robbing home runs, and I think a 7-foot wall is going to give him more opportunity to rob home runs and help our pitchers out.”
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Before the 2023 season, the Tigers will move in the center-field fence 10 feet, from 422 feet to 412 feet, and drop the height of that wall from 8½ feet to 7 feet. The wall in right-center field will lower from 13 feet to 7 feet, and the wall in right field will lower from 8½ feet to 7 feet.
The height of the fences will measure 7 feet around the entire ballpark.
“I feel like it’s a good thing that the fences were lowered,” Greene said Monday on WXYT-FM (97.1). “There’s still going to be a lot of room out there, so I’ll definitely still have a lot of time to get to the ball. I just feel like I have a way better shot (of robbing home runs) with a 7-foot fence. It’s definitely going to be a little easier to get up there on a 7-foot wall.”
Greene robbed his first (and only) home run at Comerica Park on July 13, 2020, in an intrasquad game before the COVID-shortened season. A ridiculous catch in left field, where the height of the wall has always been 7 feet, took a homer away from slugger C.J. Cron.
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Less than two years later, Greene made his MLB debut June 18, 2022 at Comerica Park.
Three months after that, on Sept. 25, Greene hustled to the warning track and completed a leaping catch to rob White Sox first baseman Andrew Vaughn of a home run in the fourth inning at Guaranteed Rate Field in…