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Tarik Skubal is on the Dodgers’ radar — and according to Ken Rosenthal at Yahoo Sports, the front office simply can’t “ignore” the possibility of acquiring the Tigers’ ace ahead of the trade deadline. Rosenthal laid out his case for why the Dodgers should be in on Skubal, framing it as the kind of move a team with championship aspirations has to at least explore seriously.

Skubal has established himself as one of the best pitchers in all of baseball. The left-hander won the American League Cy Young Award in 2024, posting a dominant season with Detroit that announced him as a true frontline starter. He pairs a wipeout slider with a fastball that plays up thanks to elite extension and deception, and his ability to miss bats while limiting hard contact puts him in rare company. He’s the kind of arm that changes the complexion of a pitching staff — not a rental piece, but a genuine difference-maker. For a Dodgers team that has dealt with pitching attrition all season (and every season, it seems), adding someone of Skubal’s caliber would be a massive statement.

The Tigers, of course, would demand a king’s ransom. Skubal isn’t a free agent soon — he has club control that extends beyond this season, which only drives his price up. Detroit would almost certainly ask for multiple top-tier prospects, and we’ve already seen reports that the Dodgers’ deep outfield prospect haul could fuel deadline deals. That stockpile of young talent is exactly the kind of currency needed to pry a pitcher like Skubal away from a rebuilding club. The question is whether Andrew Friedman and the front office are willing to go that deep into the prospect pool for one player, even one this good.

I think Rosenthal’s framing is exactly right here. You don’t have to think a Skubal deal is likely to acknowledge that the Dodgers would be foolish not to engage. Our rotation has shown flashes of dominance — Yoshinobu Yamamoto has been excellent, Roki Sasaki just shut down the Mets — but the depth behind those two has been a concern all year. Walker Buehler hasn’t been consistently healthy, Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow are still working their way back from injuries, and Dustin May remains a question mark. Adding Skubal wouldn’t just patch a hole; it would give us arguably the most fearsome one-two-three punch in baseball come October.

The cost would be steep. That’s undeniable. But this is the kind of move you make when you have the prospect capital and the win-now mandate. The Dodgers have both. Rosenthal isn’t saying the deal is close or even that formal talks are underway — this is more about the logic of the pursuit. And the logic is sound. If Detroit is genuinely willing to listen on Skubal, we’d better be on the phone. Whether the price ultimately makes sense is a different conversation, but walking away without even engaging would be a mistake for a team built to win it all right now.

Source(s): Ken Rosenthal (Yahoo Sports) | First reported: July 26, 2026 8:22 AM UTC

God Bless and Go Dodgers