Tarik Skubal Opens Up About Approach to Tigers Offseason Trade Rumors
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Tarik Skubal is baseball’s best pitcher. He shouldn’t be traded, right? Well, the Detroit Tigers ace had an offseason filled with rumors.
While Skubal was enjoying his second straight American League Cy Young award and committing to play for Team USA in the World Baseball Classic, rumors swirled that the Tigers might trade him. It was a perfect storm.
He was entering his final year of team control, and his agent is Scott Boras, notorious for taking his clients to market. To outsiders, Detroit had to at least explore the idea to get as much out of Skubal as it could — assuming it didn’t want to pay him top dollar to stay long-term.
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Well, for 2026 he will get top dollar. Skubal won his arbitration case with the Tigers and will make $32 million, the highest figure ever awarded in MLB salary arbitration. But he wasn’t immune to the speculation. He could hear it.
How Tarik Skubal Dealt with Trade Speculation
During an interview with Ben Verlander on his “Flippin’ Bats” podcast, Skubal talked about how he dealt with the rumors. He started by saying he wanted to word it right to ensure Tigers fans that he truly wanted to stay this season.
“It's not that I was worried about getting traded because obviously that's out of my control,” Skubal said. “But it's one of those things where you can't really worry about it — and I don't want that to sound like I didn't want to be a Detroit Tiger — that's not what I want that to sound like. It’s out of my control, so I can't really stress about it. It does me no good to have it impact my offseason workouts or have it impact my day-to-day life.”
Skubal spent most of his offseason in Detroit. During one high-profile sports weekend in December, he was at a college basketball game, a Detroit Red Wings game and a Detroit Lions game. It seemed to outsiders to be a full-court press to communicate to everyone how much he wanted to stay with the Tigers.
Entering 2026, he’s in position to do something rare — win three Cy Young awards in a row and for a career.
The left-hander has been brilliant the past two seasons. In 2024 he went 18-4 with a 2.39 ERA and 228 strikeouts as he won the American League pitching triple crown. That helped him win his first Cy Young and finish seventh in AL MVP voting.
Last year, his win-loss record wasn’t quite as good, as he went 13-6. But he bettered his 2024 season in other respects, including a 2.21 ERA and 241 strikeouts. He won his second Cy Young and finished fifth in AL MVP voting.
He became the 12th pitcher in Major League history to win back-to-back Cy Young awards and the second Tigers player to do it. Denny McLain won the award in 1968 and 1969.
Matthew Postins is an award-winning sports journalist who covers Major League Baseball for OnSI. He also covers the Big 12 Conference for Heartland College Sports.
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