Jon ConahanSat, November 22, 2025 at 4:38 AM UTC·2 min readEx-Tigers 15-year veteran suggest team trades Tarik Skubal to Yankees originally appeared on The Sporting News. Add The Sporting News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
Unfortunately for teams like the Detroit Tigers, there are always questions about whether they'll move on from their top players due to payroll concerns.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementIf the Tigers are serious about winning long-term, there seems to be an obvious answer to this whole Tarik Skubal thing. The simple fact here is that if the Tigers want to win, they need to give him a blank check and walk out of the room.
Skubal is obviously the best pitcher in the American League, winning back-to-back Cy Young Awards, and he's still only 29 years old.
Despite that, the noise has certainly been there, and former New York Yankees outfielder Cameron Maybin started to rev them up a bit more on Twitter/X.
Maybin suggested that the Yankees should do whatever it takes to land a player of Skubal’s caliber, and while it might not be smart to pay him what he wants, he envisions one of the best rotations in baseball if they landed him.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement“Tucker and Bellinger will shake up somebody’s offseason, but the move that would take over the entire league is the Yankees going to get Skubal. Tigers clearly don't want to pay him or they would have already....
“I'm sure they're trying to justify or convince themselves how's it's probably not smart to pay Skubal what he deserves.... But Imagine pairing him with a healthy Sandy Alcantara in the Bronx along with Fried, Cole, Rodon,” he wrote. “That is a playoff nightmare for every lineup in baseball. And I don’t want to hear anything about payroll. This is the Yankees. If you want to win you find a way to make it happen!”
Tigers need the best package for Tarik Skubal, no matter from who
If the Tigers eventually move on from Skubal, it's important that the front office gets back the best package out there.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementUltimately, they probably want to do right by Skubal, but they have to worry about their future rather than his.
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