Recent reports have linked Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Tarik Skubal to a potential trade with the Orioles–with one scout even attending Orioles minor league games to watch top prospect Jackson Holliday. Despite recent MLB trade deadline buzz surrounding the Tigers' star pitcher, multiple MLB executives say he's staying put.
“They ain’t trading [Tarik Skubal],” one rival executive said to The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal. “No chance they move him,” said another.
It stands to reason the Tigers would want to keep Skubal after an incredible start to the 2024 season.
The 27-year-old Skubal has been arguably the best pitcher in Major League Baseball this year, sporting a league-best 2.35 ERA with 12 wins and 154 strikeouts in 130.0 innings pitched. In the 21 games that Skubal has started this year, he has pitched 6.0 innings or more 18 times. His shortest start of the year came back on June 19th when he was chased from a game in Atlanta after allowing four earned runs on seven hits in four innings pitched a 7-0 loss to the Braves.
Tarik Skubal staying put despite Tigers' active trade talks
While Skubal has dominated throughout the first half of the season, the Tigers have been middling, sitting at 52-55 and 12.0 games back of the first-place Guardians in the AL Central. MLB experts say that the team will likely ship fellow ace Jack Flaherty and other pieces before the MLB trade deadline in an effort to rebuild.
The veteran Flaherty will be a free agent in 2025 and could make north of the $14 million the Tigers paid him in 2024.
Tarik Skubal, meanwhile, still is under team control through 2027 and will likely be a piece the team builds around for 2025. Skubal's current contract has him making $2,650,000 in 2024. After what could be a Cy Young-winning season in 2024, Skubal and his agent Scott Boras will likely fetch a hefty sum during arbitration in 2025–a price the Tigers are willing to pay.
After all, the Tigers are no strangers to long-term, big-time contracts. In 2025, the Tigers are due to pay fellow starter Kenta Maeda $10 million and Javier Baez $25 million.
By letting go of Mark Canha's $11.5 million, Flaherty's $14 million and potentially Andrew Chafin's $6.5 million contracts, the Tigers could have plenty of wiggle room to extend their blossoming star to a long-term deal.
Skubal was drafted by the Tigers in 2018 and has spent his entire career in the motor city, struggling in 2020 and 2021 before eventually finding his footing in 2022 and 2023. With this recent news regarding Tarik Skubal's future at the trade deadline, it appears that the Tigers are prepared to keep their ace around for a long time.
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