Will the Tigers Actually Trade Tarik Skubal? Why the Two-Time Cy Young Winner Probably Stays in Detroit
Tarik Skubal is the best pitcher in baseball. The Detroit Tigers are trying to decide whether to trade him. The answer is starting to look like no.
MLB Trade Rumors and CBS Sports both reported this week that the Tigers are leaning toward keeping their two-time Cy Young Award winner through the August 3 deadline. Detroit has gone 10-4 in July and 25-15 since the start of June. They currently sit just 4.5 games out of a playoff position in the American League with more than two months of regular season left to play.
Teams do not trade their best pitcher when they are 4.5 games out of a playoff spot. That is not how baseball works.
The Interest Is Real
The Tampa Bay Rays are pursuing Skubal aggressively. So are the Chicago Cubs and Atlanta Braves. The Los Angeles Dodgers are floating around the edges as a potential landing spot if Detroit decides to sell. The list of interested teams reads like a who’s who of legitimate contenders.
Skubal is a 29-year-old ace with a fastball in the high 90s, a devastating changeup, and the kind of command that separates legitimate front-line starters from everyone else. He is under club control through 2026, which means any trade would require the Tigers to give up an ace and a half-season and a full season of team control.
The return for a pitcher of that caliber would be historic. Multiple top prospects. Major-league talent. Draft compensation. The Tigers would essentially rebuild their farm system overnight if they moved him.
The Tigers Are Winning, Which Changes Everything
Detroit is in the middle of an unexpected run. Kerry Carpenter is producing again. Riley Greene is putting together an MVP-caliber season. The pitching staff behind Skubal is finding form. The team is playing meaningful baseball in late July, which nobody in the American League Central expected coming into the season.
That changes the math on Skubal. If the Tigers were 20 games under .500, this would be an easy call. Trade him. Restock the system. Try again in 2027. But at 4.5 games out of a playoff spot with a legitimate shot to make a run, keeping Skubal is the only defensible move.
Fans want to make the playoffs. Owners want to make the playoffs. Front offices want to make the playoffs. Trading the ace of your rotation in the middle of a competitive stretch is how you lose all three constituencies at once.
The Luxury Tax Angle
There is a secondary reason keeping Skubal makes sense. The Tigers are not close to the luxury tax threshold. Skubal is making around $10.15 million this season through arbitration. There is no financial reason to move him.
Some teams shed salary at the deadline to avoid tax penalties. Detroit has no such concern. If the Tigers were bumping against the tax line and needed relief, moving Skubal would be understandable. They are not. He stays.
The Extension Question Is Coming
The real story with Skubal is not whether Detroit trades him this July. The real story is whether Detroit extends him before he hits free agency after next season. The Tigers have to figure out how to pay a pitcher who is about to command $35 million or more per year.
That is the conversation that matters. This deadline is a formality. Skubal is staying, Detroit is making a run, and the front office will worry about the extension question when the season is over.
Rival executives seem to agree with the read. The Rays, Cubs and Braves should probably pivot to other options. Tarik Skubal is a Tiger for the rest of this season and probably for a while longer.
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.
