Tarik Skubal's Injury Should Lead to a More Active Trade Deadline

Detroit's ace will undergo elbow surgery and is expected to miss two to three months. Other teams hoping to court the pending free agent must plan accordingly.

Tigers pitcher Tarik Skubal will be sidelined until at least the summer. | Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Tarik Skubal’s elbow injury may affect the Tigers’ October. It should affect everyone else’s July. 

The double reigning American League Cy Young Award winner—and the prize of the upcoming free agent class—will undergo surgery to remove loose bodies in his left elbow, Detroit manager AJ Hinch told reporters on Monday. He declined to offer a timetable, but other players who have had such procedures have been out two or three months. And there’s no way to know for sure how Skubal will pitch once he returns. 

“It sucks,” Skubal reportedly said. 

For Skubal and the Tigers, absolutely. But also for all the clubs who believed they could solve all their problems by writing a big check this winter. This winter’s free agent pool was already unusually shallow, in part because of all the extensions players have signed recently. (Among others, Red Sox pitcher Garrett Crochet, Phillies pitcher Jesús Luzardo and Cubs second baseman Nico Hoerner were all due to hit free agency this year before their teams locked them up.) 

Skubal remains far and away the best player available, still a good bet to clear $400 million. The second- and third-place options are probably Mets righty Freddy Peralta, who might make half that, and Mets third baseman Bo Bichette, who reportedly turned down about $200 million from the Phillies this winter in favor of a short-term deal with a high average annual value and opt-outs in New York. Both are good players who can make a major impact. The 30-year-old Skubal, who leads the AL in ERA (2.34), strikeouts (514, or an average of 253 per season) and innings pitched (430 ⅔, or an average of 212 per season) since the beginning of 2024, is more than that. But he is no longer a sure thing. 

That means teams that believe they are one major piece away from a title might want to start figuring out what it would take to pry that piece away from their rivals. Especially with the uncertainty surrounding what the game’s economic structure will look like once the league and the players’ union agree on a collective-bargaining agreement to replace the one that expires at in December—the Yankees and Cody Bellinger inserted language to lockout-proof his deal this winter—there is good reason to start building the 2027 roster in '26, even if that means paying inflated prospect prices. 

If the Red Sox cannot right the ship, might they entertain offers on first baseman Triston Casas, who is in his first year of arbitration, or right fielder Wilyer Abreu, who has not even reached it yet? If the Orioles continue to struggle, would they be willing to deal catcher Adley Rutschman or first baseman Ryan Mountcastle, both of whom can be free agents after next year? The Marlins are playing well, but they always seem ready to deal righty Sandy Alcántara, whom they owe $15 million over the next year and a half. Same with the Rays and first baseman Yandy Díaz. The Twins blew up their roster at the deadline last year; maybe they would do it again by trading center fielder Byron Buxton, catcher Ryan Jeffers, righty Joe Ryan or righty Bailey Ober. 

Maybe none of these players will be available. But the Tarik Skubal we have come to know might not be, either. 

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