Tigers Ace Tarik Skubal Reveals Plan for Approach to ABS Challenge System
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The Detroit Tigers are just a few weeks away from getting started with a 2026 season which has as much potential as the team has had in some time now.
After a quiet offseason until February, the Tigers lit the Motor City on fire with some seriously exciting signings to establish an elite pitching staff, and this blended with some internal improvement could make for a special campaign.
Baseball in general though continues to evolve and look different, and this year might just be the best example yet of that. With the automated balls and strikes challenge system coming this year, everyone is planning how they are going to approach such a radical change.
Interestingly, Detroit ace Tarik Skubal revealed that his plan for how he will challenge the umpires is really not to do it at all, and rather leave things up to his catchers.
Tarik Skubal Will Not Be Challenging Many Pitches for Tigers
"Tarik Skubal says he probably won't challenge calls with the ABS system this year unless it's an egregious call, right down the middle," baseball insider Buster Olney reported over the weekend. "He'd rather just leave those decisions to his catchers."
While Skubal could change his tune in the first inning of his first start this year should he feel he was done wrong on a call, it certainly seems like his intentions are to be cool, calm and calculated when it comes to challenging calls for Detroit.
Catchers have likely a better perspective as the ones who are framing it up and trying to make a ball look like a strike and they have become so good at it to the point where even Skubal could be fooled. For this reason, likely most pitchers will choose to let the ones behind the backstop handle making these decisions.
How ABS System Will Work for Tigers, Others
Starting this season, hitters, pitchers and catchers all will be able to have the right to call for a review if they think the umpire has made the wrong call, at which point the video board will show whether the ump or the challenger is correct.
It's a very quick process and teams will be allowed two per game, keeping them unless they are to get it wrong. In spring training so far, teams have been getting a ton of their challenges right which obviously leads to numerous reviews, and it will be interesting to see how the process changes and is tweaked.
Dillon Dingler is going to be facing a ton of pressure to get these calls right, as will Detroit hitters since it is such an advantage to possess a challenge late in the game when calls are even more consequential.
Skubal is always wise when it comes to game preparation and how he attacks a lineup, and the ABS system is now just another tool in his toolbox. Unless something is completely egregious though, it sounds like he does not plan on using it a whole lot.
Michael Brauner is a 2022 graduate of the University of Alabama with a degree in Sports Media. He covers various MLB teams across the On SI network and you can also find his work on Yellowhammer News covering the Alabama Crimson Tide and Auburn Tigers as well as on the radio producing and co-hosting 'The Opening Kickoff' every weekday morning on 105.5 WNSP FM in Mobile, Alabama.