Just saw that the Tigers released Gary Sheffield. Very surprising since he sits at 499 home runs, and you would think that next one would be worth a few tickets sold, at least to help pay for his $14 million salary for 2009.

What this shows, without doubt in my mind, is the business of baseball has changed in the past off-season. For a long time minor league coaches have had the concern of what happens when Non-prospects (NPs) stand in the way of a better, younger player moving up the ladder. Think about Crash Davis in Bull Durham sitting at AAA and blocking Matt Wieters (or Buster Posey or Justin Smoak) from getting his feet wet at that level. Sheffield with his expensive contract was blocking a younger player from getting some AB’s, but not anymore. Teams are more interested in moving the kids along, giving them a chance to play, then letting the expensive guy who might be better in the short term but probably not better for the long term stick around.

Its a new ballgame. And the aftershocks of this past off-season are going to continue to reverberate.

For more information, here is the Jon Paul Morosi story from the Detroit Free Press.