Tarik Skubal is the best pitcher in baseball. He is also a free agent after the 2026 season. The Detroit Tigers have to make the hardest decision of their offseason, and they have to make it in the next six weeks.
The 2024 Cy Young Award winner is having another dominant year. Skubal is 9-3 with a 2.31 ERA, 138 strikeouts, and a 0.92 WHIP through his first 17 starts. He is the kind of ace every contender wants in a playoff rotation. He is also the biggest trade chip on the entire market.
The Tigers are in an awkward spot. They are 38-37 and on the edge of the AL Wild Card race. They are not bad enough to obviously sell. They are not good enough to make a long deep October run. The fence-sitting position has been part of the Detroit front office’s identity for two years.
The case for trading Skubal is overwhelming on paper. He is going to want at least $30 million annually on his next contract. He is represented by Scott Boras, who is not known for in-season negotiations or hometown discounts. The Tigers are unlikely to be able to extend him before he hits the open market, which means he walks for nothing if they do not trade him.
The case for keeping Skubal is more emotional. The Tigers have not been to the playoffs since 2014. They are in the middle of a rebuild that has produced real young talent. Trading their ace would feel like surrender to a fanbase that has been through too many bad seasons already.
Scott Harris, the Tigers president of baseball operations, has been telling reporters all spring that the team has no plans to trade Skubal. That kind of statement is exactly what you expect from a GM in his position. The actual answer comes down to what the market offers.
The Dodgers are the team to watch. Los Angeles has a massive payroll, a deep farm system, and a desperate need for postseason rotation help after another second-round exit. The Dodgers can offer the kind of prospect package that justifies trading a Cy Young winner.
The Yankees are also lurking. New York has been aggressive at the deadline for the last several years under Brian Cashman, and Skubal would be the kind of move that puts them over the top in a wide-open AL. The Yankees have prospect depth and would be willing to pay the price.
The Mets, Phillies, and Orioles round out the legitimate suitors. All three have postseason aspirations. All three have prospect capital. All three would benefit from adding the best pitcher in baseball to their rotation.
The asking price for Skubal would be historic. Think two top-50 prospects, a controllable major league piece, and a wild-card prospect. Some executives have suggested it could be three top-100 prospects in a single trade, which would be the biggest prospect haul for any pitcher trade in the modern era.
For Skubal personally, the situation is complicated. He has built his career in Detroit. He likes the city. He has talked openly about wanting to win a World Series with the Tigers. But the contract reality is that the Tigers have not extended him, and his earning power on the open market is enormous.
The Boras factor matters. Skubal’s agent has historically pushed clients to test free agency rather than sign extensions, and the financial case for Skubal doing so is obvious. He could realistically sign for $35 million annually over six or seven years with the Mets, Dodgers, or another big-market team.
The Tigers also have to think about competitive balance. If Skubal walks for nothing, the franchise gets compensatory draft picks, but those are dramatically less valuable than what a trade package would deliver. Letting him hit the open market is essentially leaving real value on the table.
The honest read is that the Tigers should trade Skubal. The numbers support it. The team’s competitive window supports it. The asset value supports it. The only thing that does not support it is the optics of a team trading its best player when it is technically still in the playoff race.
What will actually happen depends on the next four weeks. If Detroit goes on a hot streak and climbs into legitimate playoff position, Skubal stays. If they fade to 10 games below .500, the trade conversations get very real, very fast.
The MLB trade deadline this year will be remembered for whoever lands Tarik Skubal. The bidding war is about to begin.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
