{"id":34461,"date":"2026-06-19T23:10:57","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T23:10:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/19\/tarik-skubal-tigers-must-improve-before-trade-deadline-or-else\/"},"modified":"2026-06-19T23:10:57","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T23:10:57","slug":"tarik-skubal-tigers-must-improve-before-trade-deadline-or-else","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/19\/tarik-skubal-tigers-must-improve-before-trade-deadline-or-else\/","title":{"rendered":"Tarik Skubal: Tigers must improve before trade deadline &#8216;or else&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"article-meta\"><span class=\"timestamp \">Jun 18, 2026, 11:07 PM ET<\/span><\/div>\n<p>Ace left-hander <a data-player-guid=\"2e709af2-d8bb-3d70-978d-f33a50695c14\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/player\/_\/id\/42409\/tarik-skubal\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Tarik Skubal<\/a> has made it clear as the <a data-clubhouse-guid=\"b27c64bf-4f18-f713-ba06-db1bce2394e7\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/team\/_\/name\/det\/detroit-tigers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Detroit Tigers<\/a> continue to drop games and fall further out of contention as the clock ticks down to the trade deadline: &#8220;Play better baseball or else.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Skubal, who will <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/49055330\/tigers-skubal-shows-rust-return-elbow-surgery\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">make his second start<\/a> Friday since having an innovative surgical procedure May 6 to remove bone fragments from his elbow, could be in line for a precedent-setting contract as he is set to enter free agency after this season.<\/p>\n<p>If the Tigers fall further out of contention, they have the option of trading the two-time defending American League Cy Young Award winner.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The reality is we need to play better baseball or else, come the deadline, you give the front office an option to reassess where this team is,&#8221; Skubal <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/CbEj5r08FZ\">told The Detroit News<\/a> earlier this week in a story published Thursday. &#8220;And if they don&#8217;t think what we have is a World Series- or playoff-caliber team, then the whole team is going to look different. That&#8217;s just the nature of the beast.&#8221;<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline inline-photo full\">\n<figure><picture><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0521%2Fr1661566_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=570&amp;format=jpg, https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0521%2Fr1661566_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=1140&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(min-width: 376px)\"><source data-srcset=\"https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0521%2Fr1661566_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=375, https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0521%2Fr1661566_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg&amp;w=750&amp;cquality=40&amp;format=jpg 2x\" media=\"(max-width: 375px)\"><img class=\" lazyload lazyload\" data-image-container=\".inline-photo\" height=\"320\" width=\"570\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/picture><figcaption class=\"photoCaption\">Tarik Skubal, who is scheduled to be a free agent after this season, said the Tigers have to play better &#8220;or else, come the [trade] deadline, you give the front office an option to reassess where this team is.&#8221;\u00a0<cite>Rich von Biberstein\/Icon Sportswire<\/cite><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/aside>\n<p>The Tigers (30-44) are 9\u00bd games back of the <a data-clubhouse-guid=\"8f4800c6-3c05-b3d5-8186-9750cd72a3c2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/team\/_\/name\/chw\/chicago-white-sox\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Chicago White Sox<\/a> in the AL Central and 6\u00bd games out of the final AL wild-card spot entering Friday. The Tigers host the White Sox for a three-game series this weekend.<\/p>\n<p>Major League Baseball&#8217;s trade deadline is Aug. 3.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"inline editorial float-r\" data-behavior=\"article_related\">\n<h2 class=\"editorial-title\">Editor&#8217;s Picks<\/h2>\n<p>2 Related<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>&#8220;The future for a lot of people in this room &#8212; not just myself &#8212; the outlook could look very much different in two months and it all comes to an abrupt end,&#8221; Skubal told The Detroit News. &#8220;We still control our destiny a little bit. We still do.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We play the team this weekend that&#8217;s winning our division. It&#8217;s another big series. You don&#8217;t want to be playing playoff baseball in June, but it feels like we&#8217;re playing playoff baseball. We don&#8217;t have very much room for error, and everyone understands that. Everyone understands there has to be a sense of urgency. There has to be. Not panic. But there has to be a sense of urgency to try to win every game we play.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Tigers&#8217; other pending free agents after this season include <a data-player-guid=\"b67b2b70-c956-9fa3-7daa-0d7ff891fb5a\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/player\/_\/id\/29630\/kenley-jansen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kenley Jansen<\/a>, <a data-player-guid=\"a3fa18ed-b06e-079d-533f-d5e9a4356028\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/player\/_\/id\/41167\/casey-mize\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Casey Mize<\/a>, <a data-player-guid=\"17807b1c-5611-ec45-874b-33bb63e08a91\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/player\/_\/id\/33804\/gleyber-torres\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Gleyber Torres<\/a> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/player\/_\/id\/33837\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Jack Flaherty<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think about it a lot,&#8221; Skubal said of the trade deadline. &#8220;I try not to let that consume me because I need to worry about what I&#8217;m doing today. &#8230; But there&#8217;s also the reality part to it. Everybody, the whole room, needs to focus on winning tonight&#8217;s game, winning a series, winning the next series and just let it snowball.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jun 18, 2026, 11:07 PM ET Ace left-hander Tarik Skubal has made it clear as the Detroit Tigers continue to<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":34462,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_animmysite_disable_animation":false,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/a4.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2026%2F0521%2Fr1661566_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[214],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-34461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-usa-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34461"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34461\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34462"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trendifyhubusa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}