Tarik Skubal says he embraces pressure, and there’s probably no one in baseball with more pressure on him right now than the latest ace on the Los Angeles Dodgers’ payroll.
Skubal took the mound against the Chicago Cubs on Tuesday night at Wrigley Field knowing the Dodgers expected to win with him pitching. He also expected to win, as hope seemingly is not a word in Skubal’s vocabulary.
“That’s what holds me accountable,” Skubal said. “My teammates, when we take the field, we’re going to fully expect to win on days I go, and I don’t take that for granted at all. And I love it. I want the same feeling.
“All that (pressure) stuff, it’s a privilege to be able to play this game and perform at the highest level, on the biggest stages. It’s what you dream of as a 12-year-old.
“Everyone has dreamt of hitting the walk-off home run. I don’t know if anyone has dreamt of … at least I wasn’t dreaming of pitching as a 12-year-old. I was dreaming of hitting the home run. Home runs are cooler than pitching. It’s an honor and you dream of it every single day and hopefully that becomes a reality and I get to go out and perform on big stages.”
In his first-ever start at Wrigley, Skubal gave up four hits and two runs in six innings while striking out six and taking the loss. He gave up a leadoff home run to Dansby Swanson in the third inning.
The atmosphere at Wrigley was supersized by Skubal’s Dodgers debut, which came as the result of Saturday’s trade deadline deal that brought him from Detroit for three prospects.
It’s hard to steal the spotlight from Shohei Ohtani and Pete Crow-Armstrong, who could be dueling down the stretch for the National League Most Valuable Player award.
But Skubal managed to do it, making this perhaps the most anticipated midsummer showdown at Wrigley since Kerry Wood faced New York Yankees ace Roger Clemens in 2003. That one turned into an instant classic, with the Cubs winning and igniting dreams of a Cubs-Yankees World Series that didn’t happen.
It’s not difficult to imagine what it would’ve been like with Skubal wearing Cubs pinstripes instead of the fashionably sharp Dodgers road uniforms. The Cubs were interested, naturally, but not serious enough to get something done. So Skubal was booed from the moment he headed out to the right-field bullpen 50 minutes before the start of the game, almost as if it was his fault the Cubs didn’t pull the trigger.
Cubs president Jed Hoyer instead opted to acquire two quality starters in Clay Holmes and Kevin Gausman, whom he called his “white whale” after previously trying to get him to Chicago. (That would make Hoyer the Captain Ahab in “Moby-Dick,” though Gausman didn’t bite his leg off, as Moby Dick did to Ahab in the Herman Melville classic).
Hoyer said Monday he had “a lot of conversations” with Tigers president Scott Harris, who once worked for him in the Cubs front office. He praised the Dodgers for coming up with the right combination of players, and Harris for getting the best return possible.
It was all love from Hoyer.
“The Dodgers have done a fantastic job in player development,” Hoyer said. “They have a really good farm system. Scott did the best thing he could do for the Tigers and got a lot of talent back, and obviously they did the best thing for their team. He’s an incredible pitcher, there’s no question about that. I know there’s been a reaction around baseball about it, but they put themselves into position to do that deal, and they did. And that’s exactly what they should be doing.”
Harris had little choice but to deal Skubal, who is going to be a free agent after the season and figures to command over $300 million.
“The response that I got from Tarik’s agent was pretty clear that he was intent on going to free agency and exploring the market, which is totally his right, and nobody should be upset about that,” Harris told reporters after the trade. “It was very clear from the exchange what the intentions were. He deserved it. I expect him to be a free agent this winter, and we’ll see what happens from there.”
Skubal’s agent, Scott Boras, told The Athletic that after the 2024 season, when Skubal won his first Cy Young Award, Harris “informed me that he had offered a four-year contract to Tarik for $75 million.”
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Boras told Harris he was thinking more in the area of an eight-year deal.
Whatever.
Harris didn’t trade Skubal after the ’25 season, when he won his second Cy Young Award, hoping they could still win together in Detroit and maybe live happily ever after. Then he and Skubal couldn’t agree on a contract and went to arbitration, where Skubal was awarded a record-shattering $32 million compared to the Tigers’ offer of $19 million. It was the beginning of the end for Skubal in Motown.
It now seems clear that Skubal is in the perfect place for him. The Dodgers are an organization that can afford to give him that kind of megadeal, and it’s also a team that should always be in position to win a championship. He can also be one singular star in a sky full of them in Dodgerland, instead of the Big Tuna on a team like the Cubs.
“I’m not going to talk about the business side of what’s happening with me,” Skubal said. “Obviously I understand the free agency angle, but I want the message to be I’m excited to be here and to learn everything about the Dodgers and all these guys here.”
After all the talk before and after the deadline, Skubal just wanted to do what he does best — throw a baseball. He doesn’t care if fans are upset at the Dodgers for making a great team even better, and makes no apologies for wanting to win.
“There’s nothing I can really do to change a narrative or say anything, and there is a lot of stuff I don’t even want to get into either,” he said. “It is what it is, and it’s just noise. I’ll let you guys talk about all that stuff. I’m going to be focused on winning baseball games.”
Skubal was on the big stage, at an iconic ballpark with fans booing his every move.
It’s what every 12-year-old dreams of.