It’s been said that baseball, a sport that’s been around now for 185 years, can still produce something we’ve never seen. We could see that happen once again within the next week with Detroit Tigers pitcher Tarik Skubal, but it would not involve what the American League Central team does with its ace on the field.
Ahead of the July 30 MLB trade deadline, Skubal has emerged as a possible player on the move. The 27-year-old southpaw also happens to be the current favorite to win this year’s AL Cy Young Award. BetMGM Michigan Sportsbook prices him at -130, which equals an implied probability of 56.5%.
While it’s far from a lock that the Tigers will move Skubal within the next week, BetMichigan.com has established the following odds on where he may finish the season. These odds are for infotainment purposes only. You will not find them at any licensed Michigan sports betting operator like Caesars Sportsbook.
Team | Percentage Chance | Odds |
Detroit Tigers | 75.0% | -300 |
Baltimore Orioles | 9.1% | +1000 |
Los Angeles Dodgers | 9.1% | +1000 |
New York Yankees | 2.0% | +5000 |
San Diego Padres | 1.6% | +6000 |
The Field | 3.2% | +3000 |
Odds provided by BetMichigan and not available on MI betting apps.
Skubal is having a tremendous season for the Tigers. He’s 11-3 with an AL-leading 2.34 earned run average and 146 strikeouts, second-best in the league. He also leads the Junior Circuit with a pitcher WAR rating of 5.1.
The .786 winning percentage also leads the AL, and Skubal is just one win away from tying the AL leaders in that category. He’s also just 11 strikeouts behind in the AL strikeout race. If Skubal were to lead the AL in wins, ERA and strikeouts this season, he’d become the 13th AL hurler to win the pitching Triple Crown, joining former Tiger greats Hal Newhouser (1945) and Justin Verlander (2011) in accomplishing the feat.
USA Today photo by Ken Blaze.
Although Skubal dominates on the mound, the Tigers flounder in the games between his starts. At 51-53 through Thursday afternoon, Detroit is in fourth place in the division and 11 games behind the AL Central-leading Cleveland Guardians. The team is 5.5 games back of division rival Kansas City Royals for the third and final Wild Card berth. However, there are three other teams between KC and Detroit in the standings.
All that adds up to the Tigers having playoff odds of just 7.7%, according to Baseball-Reference.com. Oddsmakers at DraftKings Michigan give Detroit +10000 odds to win the division and +700 odds to make the playoffs in some fashion. Skubal is under team control for another couple of years, but he’s arbitration eligible, which means he’ll earn a lot more than the $2.65 million he’s getting this season.
Given that, the Tigers have a couple of options. They can hold on to their ace and try to build a more competitive team around him before he’s eligible for free agency in 2027. That could prove to be difficult as Detroit has the eighth-smallest payroll in MLB at nearly $107.5 million.
Or, team executives can leverage Skubal’s remaining years under team control and try to get a windfall of prospects and MLB-ready players who cost less and have more control years in an effort to bolster its postseason chances for 2025 and beyond.
How rare would it be for a potential Cy Young winner to be dealt during the season he won it? Only once in MLB history has that occurred, and that was 40 years ago. Even then, it really wasn’t the same as what may occur with Skubal.
On June 13, 1984, the Chicago Cubs and Cleveland Indians completed a seven-player deal. Among the players involved were Rick Sutcliffe, who went to Chicago, and Joe Carter, who headed the other way on Interstate 00.
Sutcliffe started the 1984 season with a 4-5 record and a 5.15 ERA in 15 starts. He made 20 for the Cubs over the next three-plus months, going 16-1 with a 2.69 ERA, seven complete games and three shutouts, propelling the Cubbies to their first postseason appearance in 39 years. That was good enough to make him, at the time, the fifth pitcher to win a Cy Young unanimously.
There are now 20 pitchers who can make that claim, including Tigers greats Justin Verlander (who did it twice) and Denny McLain, the last 30-game winner in the bigs.
Author
Steve is an accomplished, award-winning reporter with more than 20 years of experience covering gaming, sports, politics and business. He has written for the Associated Press, Reuters, The Louisville Courier Journal, The Center Square and numerous other publications. Based in Louisville, Ky., Steve has covered the expansion of sports betting in the U.S. and other gaming matters.
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