Tigers Clinch No. 1 Pick in 2020 MLB Draft with Loss vs. Twins

There's a faint silver lining in Detroit.   

By losing 5-1 to the Minnesota Twins on Wednesday night, the Detroit Tigers secured the No. 1 overall pick in the 2020 MLB draft.

The Tigers are a league-worst 46-111. With five games left to play, their maximum possible win total is 51, which is below MLB's second-worst 52-106 Baltimore Orioles.

This season is the club's third sub-.500 campaign in a row, but the Tigers haven't owned the league's worst record since 2003 when they finished 43-119. That team set the record for most losses by an American League squad and came without one defeat of tying the 1962 New York Mets for the most single-season losses since integration (h/t CBS Sports).

Their reward? Justin Verlander, and we all know how that turned out.

However, the Tigers don't have to go as far back to remember the last time they owned the top overall pick. In 2018, they took right-handed pitcher Casey Mize out of Auburn. 

"Unlike the 2018 Draft in which the Tigers drafted Casey Mize, next year's Draft has the potential for an elite hitter to go first," MLB.com's Jason Beck wrote. "By most accounts, Arizona State first baseman Spencer Torkelson has the chance to be a slugging star. And though it's rare to see a first baseman drafted first overall, Al Avila was part of the Marlins scouting department that last did it, drafting high-school slugger Adrian Gonzalez in 2000."

To Beck's point, the Tigers have scored the fewest runs in the league (569). Additionally, Miguel Cabrera made the shift to primarily playing as a designated hitter this season.

With Cabrera as one of only three remaining members of the 2014 Tigers (Buck Farmer, Drew VerHagen), the last group to make the postseason, it's time to usher a new era into Detroit.