Tarik Skubal is going to dominate baseball’s headlines for the next few days. The two-time reigning AL Cy Young winner may have made his final start in a Detroit uniform yesterday. The Tigers squandered a 7-0 lead and find themselves 6.5 games back in the AL Central and 4.5 out in the Wild Card standings. They’d need to surpass five teams in the latter race.
That has unsurprisingly led to increasing speculation about the chance of a Skubal blockbuster. The Tigers are off today and will open a three-game road series against the A’s as the lead-up to the deadline. It may be too late to stave off a sale of their impending free agents — which also include Casey Mize, Gleyber Torres, Jack Flaherty (currently injured) and Kenley Jansen — even with a sweep.
Detroit’s front office may want to wait until after Sunday’s game to see exactly where they are in the standings. However, Jeff Passan of ESPN writes that some executives around the league expect the Tigers to have a tentative agreement on a Skubal deal in place by Monday morning. Although the deadline isn’t until 5:00 pm Central, settling on a framework a few hours early would give them time to pivot in case there are any issues on either end of teams’ customary medical reviews of every player involved.
The Dodgers, Brewers and Rays have been most frequently connected to Skubal. They’re all atop their respective divisions. Before the draft, Baseball America ranked the Milwaukee, Tampa Bay and Los Angeles farm systems as the three best in baseball (in that order). The Brewers and Rays wouldn’t have any illusions about keeping Skubal beyond this year, but the door is open for either small-market franchise to load up for a World Series run. Passan writes that the Rays aren’t categorically opposed to parting with top center field prospect Theo Gillen but are unlikely to give him up for any rental, even Skubal.
The Dodgers would obviously have a much better chance of keeping Skubal long term, though he’s not going to sign an extension before exploring free agency. L.A. president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman has downplayed the team’s need for starting pitching but spoke generally about pursuing impact players at every chance. “There just aren’t that many star-level players in the game,” Friedman told Alden González of ESPN on Wednesday. “Any time one is available, we’re always going to participate in those conversations.”
Patrick Mooney of The Athletic reported last night that the Cubs have given some thought to a Skubal push among various rotation possibilities. Jon Heyman of The New York Post reports that the Yankees have checked in with the Tigers as well. Heyman downplays the possibility of New York winning the bidding, though, as starting pitching is the least of the team’s worries right now. Mark Feinsand of MLB.com similarly writes that the Yankees and Phillies are currently viewed more as long shots for the market’s top pitcher.
Skubal is owed roughly $9.5MM for the stretch run. The Tigers entered the day with a luxury tax payroll just below $246MM, as shown on MLBTR’s new Payroll Tracker. They saved around $970K with this afternoon’s trade of depth catcher Jake Rogers to Baltimore. That leaves them about $1MM above the $244MM luxury tax line. A Skubal trade would inevitably drop them below the CBT marker.
If they surprisingly elected to hold him, they’d presumably want to offload other salary to ensure they stay below the tax line. As MLBTR’s Steve Adams explored last week, the compensation they’d receive for Skubal (and Mize) walking as free agents would be far better if the Tigers weren’t luxury tax payers. That’s unlikely to matter now that a sell-off appears imminent.
