New Tarik Skubal Trade Rumors Reveal MLB Exec Expects 'Outrageous' Asking Price for Tigers Star

An MLB executive expressed some pessimism this week over whether Detroit Tigers ace Tarik Skubal will be moved prior to the Aug. 3 trade deadline due to Detroit's high asking price.

Speaking to Ken Rosenthal, Patrick Mooney, Katie Woo and Will Sammon of The Athletic, an anonymous NL exec said of Skubal, "He might get traded, but the early asks are going to be outrageous. And no one's going to pay that. What the Cubs did to get Chapman, they were trying to break a 108-year curse. They were definitely overly aggressive. That kind of deal is not really happening anymore, especially going into a new CBA."

Skubal is in the midst of the final year of his contract, and given that he has won back-to-back American League Cy Young Awards, he is the biggest trade chip likely to be available leading up to the deadline.

The 29-year-old southpaw missed more than a month of action this season due to loose bodies in his pitching elbow, but he returned last month and is enjoying another strong campaign.

Through 13 starts, Skubal is 5-5 with a 3.09 ERA, 0.95 WHIP and 89 strikeouts over 75.2 innings.

Entering 2026, Skubal had a sub-3.00 ERA in each of the previous three campaigns, including an AL-best 2.39 in 2024 and 2.21 in 2025.

A Skubal trade could instantly shift the balance of power and make the team that acquires him one of the top contenders to win the World Series, but it is fair to wonder just how committed the Tigers will be to moving him.

Once well out of the playoff race, the Tigers are now just 6.5 games behind the Cleveland Guardians and Chicago White Sox for the AL Central lead, and 3.5 games behind the Seattle Mariners for a wild-card spot.

The expanded playoffs keep teams in the race longer than ever before, and it is entirely possible that Detroit will still be in the thick of the playoff race by the time the trade deadline rolls around.

However, if the Tigers don't believe they have a realistic chance to re-sign him, losing Skubal for nothing in free agency could prove disastrous.

That is what happened with the Los Angeles Angels and Shohei Ohtani, as they kept him, missed the playoffs and then lost him to the Los Angeles Dodgers without getting back the bevy of prospects he undoubtedly would have commanded on the trade market.

Although the Tigers' current asking price reportedly may be making teams hesitant to trade for Skubal, there could be a middle ground that makes sense for all parties involved once the deadline gets closer.