Want to give your head a bit of twist, then go ahead and try to decipher how many of those $5.99 pizza specials Mike Ilitch's Little Caesars will need to sell in order to pay off a US$214-million contract.

I get approximately 35,726,210 pizzas, but then, I never was very good in math.

The Detroit Tigers made a big splash Tuesday, and we're not talking about the one the five-foot-11, 275-pound Prince Fielder will create when he belly flops into the hotel pool during road trips.

One moment, Victor Martinez was down with a torn ACL, and there was a gaping hole in the Tigers' batting order.

Less than a week later, the Tigers opened the vault and filled the gap with the best available power hitter on the free agent market. And all it cost them was $214 million over nine years.

On paper, it looks like a genius move.

In Fielder, 27, they acquire a first baseman who's hit 200 homers and driven in 565 runs over the past five seasons.

Coupled with Miguel Cabrera, the Tigers join the 1961 Milwaukee Braves (Eddie Mathews, Hank Aaron) as the only teams in majorleague history to suit up two players under the age of 30 each with at least 200 career home runs.

That's the good news.

The bad news?

You might want to take a seat.

The list is lengthy.

First off, Cabrera and Fielder play the same position. Apparently, the plan is to move Cabrera back to third base and move Brandon Inge, Detroit's only reliable defensive infielder, to the bench.

Sure, this team's going to hit, and then some.

But at some point, they will make three outs at the plate, and be required to do likewise with their gloves.

That could lead to some real misadventures in the field.

Memo to Tigers pitchers - you might want to load up on the strikeouts.

This move smacks of panic. What happens a year from now, when Martinez, who is signed through 2014, returns to the lineup?

Think about what's happened to the Detroit Red Wings (Uwe Krupp, Curtis Joseph) on the occasions when Tigers and Wings owner Ilitch has spent his money impulsively.

Things didn't turn out so well.

Granting a nine-year deal to an athlete who treats physical fitness as evil more than necessary is also a dangerous play. Prince's dad's career derailed steadily when he got into his 30s?

Oh yes, Prince's dad. Former Tigers first baseman Cecil Fielder.

Remember him?

Prince has tried to forget him ever since his parents went through an ugly, public divorce.

Signing with Detroit, he's guaranteed that like it or not, his dad's presence and questions about their fractured relationship from curious journalists will persistently shadow him.

When Fielder visited Comerica Park with the Milwaukee Brewers for a brief threegame series in 2007, he was a far cry from the grinning, cherubic kid who would playfully wrestle with Tony Phillips in the Tigers clubhouse.

Fielder ducked reporters, and those who got close enough to him to pose a question were greeted with scowls and curse words. He went one-for-11 at the plate during that series.

If that's what three days in Detroit did to his mood, how will every day in Motown affect his demeanour?

There's no doubt the Tigers are a loaded club in a weak American League Central Division. The title should be theirs for the taking once again. But that's also what everyone thought back in 2008, when a Detroit squad loaded with Cabrera, Edgar Renteria, Gary Sheffield and Dontrelle Willis was expected to steamroll the big-league record book.

Instead, they backpedalled to last place in the division.

Nothing is written in stone. This Fielder move could lead to an explosive summer in Tigertown.

Or it could blow up in the Tigers' faces.

BY THE NUMBERS

Prince Fielder's career statistics

GAMES: 998

HITS: 996

RUNS BATTED IN: 656

HOME RUNS: 230

BATTING AVERAGE: .282

SLUGGING PERCENTAGE: .540

STRIKEOUTS: 779