Late Saturday night, the Los Angeles Dodgers did the expected, and the unthinkable, and traded for superstar starter and the reigning American League Cy Young Award winner, Tarik Skubal.
The Dodgers sent a trio of young players to the Detroit Tigers, outfielder Zyhir Hope, pitcher River Ryan, and another minor league pitcher, Brady Smith. Hope ranked 26th overall in The Athletic’s latest prospect update, and Ryan ranked 41st. Smith was described by Fangraphs as having “nasty stuff,” and as of last week, was striking out over 14 hitters per nine innings in the minor leagues.
To say the trade sent shockwaves through baseball fan social media would be a massive understatement. Outrage reigned supreme, with many bewildered “that’s all the Tigers got?” Along with the usual, “cancel the season,” “cancel next season,” “we want a lockout,” and many other irrational seething diatribes.
DODGERS REPORTEDLY ACQUIRE ACE TARIK SKUBAL FROM TIGERS IN TRADE THAT STIRS UP MLB WORLD
But while the trade, like all deadline deals, is sure to have its critics and defenders, one thing about it is certain: Major League Baseball has a problem. It’s just not the one that the anti-Dodgers, cancel the season, lockout brigade thinks it is.
First, it’s important to define what this trade is, and isn’t, because many casual fans don’t seem to fully understand how it works. Yes, the Dodgers traded for Tarik Skubal. But for many, that implies he’ll spend the rest of his career in Los Angeles. That may or may not be the case, but that’s not what this trade determines.
Modern front offices, and dedicated fans, understand that for a player whose contract expires at the end of the season, any trade is not for the rest of their career, it’s for the remaining 9-10 regular season starts. That’s it. The Dodgers are overwhelming favorites to make the postseason, but should the unlikely happen and say, they lose 20 games in a row and miss out, they’ll have traded those players just for Skubal’s regular season starts. The return the Tigers got for 9-10 starts was outstanding, by that measure.
Hope has yet to reach the major leagues, meaning he has six seasons of team control ahead of him. He’s just 21-years-old, but dominating AA to the tune of 23 home runs and 18 steals in just 94 games. Overall, he’s hitting .293/.369/.530. Obviously that doesn’t mean he’ll replicate those statistics in the big leagues immediately, but the Tigers now have him in their organization for six major league seasons at well below market rates.
Ryan has started his major league service time clock, but prospect evaluators believe he’s ready to pitch in a rotation right now, with a “monster” fastball, per Fangraphs. He struck out nearly 11 hitters per nine innings in the minors, while walking less than two. Some bad luck on batted balls in play makes his ERA look worse, but his underlying metrics are impressive. He’s under control for years to come. Incredibly, in yet another testament to the Dodgers’ front office, they acquired Zyhir Hope in a trade with the Cubs, and River Ryan from the Padres for a utility player who’s now out of baseball.
Still, all this for maybe nine starts, and a five-day exclusive negotiating window, for a player represented by Scott Boras. Boras clients are well known for rarely, if ever, signing extensions, instead waiting for the open market to identify the highest bidder.
There’s an assumption the Dodgers will automatically sign Skubal to a long-term contract because of the trade. They may well try, but unless it comes in that five-day window, the trade will have nothing to do with it. The Dodgers traded for Manny Machado in 2018 and let him leave for the San Diego Padres. They traded for Max Scherzer and Trea Turner in 2021. Both left in free agency when their contracts expired. They traded for Yu Darvish in 2017, and he too left in free agency. Corey Seager, a homegrown Dodgers star, signed with the Texas Rangers after the 2021 season.
Given Boras’ track record, it’s a near-certainty the other 29 teams will have the same ability, if they so choose, to sign Skubal. Which is where the problem with this trade, and the reaction to it, starts. The Dodgers didn’t trade for Skubal because they outspend everyone. Any team in baseball could afford to take on the remainder of his salary. They got Skubal because, and this is where MLB’s big issue lies, they are one of a handful of teams that actually cares about winning.
Yes, the Dodgers gave up two very high quality prospects for Skubal. But teams like the Brewers, Rays, Braves or Cubs, may have been able to top LA’s offer. They weren’t willing to. Not because they don’t have quality prospects of their own, or because they couldn’t afford to pay his salary, but because they don’t seem to understand what should be the primary goal in competitive sports: winning is. Flags fly forever. Championship banners last forever.
You know what doesn’t last forever? Surplus prospect value.
Milwaukee has been the best team in baseball the last two years. They have a better record than Los Angeles thus far in 2026, and they finished four games ahead of the Dodgers in 2025. One playoff series, a ridiculously small sample size compared to nearly 300 games, doesn’t change that.
Their rotation though, will be missing Brandon Woodruff for the remainder of the season. Breakout starter Kyle Harrison is on the injured list, though is expected to rejoin the rotation soon. It’s a very good staff already, though not without some question marks. So who better to pair with the virtually unhittable Jacob Misiorowski in a playoff series than Tarik Skubal? A postseason rotation with Misiorowski, Skubal, Harrison, and another breakout, Logan Henderson, would be the best in baseball. Yes, even better than the Dodgers, particularly if Shohei Ohtani is unable to return to pitching thanks to his nagging knee injury.
Milwaukee also has a top two or three farm system in the league. They have the consensus number one overall prospect in Jesus Made. They are unlikely to be willing to sign Skubal in the offseason, making this their only opportunity to acquire him in a season where they already know they have an elite roster. If any team was set up to make a deal, considering his reasonable remaining salary, it was Milwaukee.
There’s just one problem. Their ownership does not care about winning.
Well, to be fair, they care, so long as it doesn’t interfere even slightly with the ability to rake in massive profits. Yes, if they gave up a top 30 overall prospect and two others, they might lose the surplus value calculation down the road. But if they have Tarik Skubal, they might win their first World Series…ever. Or even reach their first World Series since 1982.
Yes, Milwaukee needs prospects because they spend less money. But they’re the best in baseball at creating them from the draft and international signings. Go for it, even just once, and see if you make history and give your fans a lifelong memory. You’ll replace that prospect anyway. And again, flags fly literally forever.
But no, because down the road you might have surplus value from that prospect. Even though, of course, there are tens of millions of dollars in extra revenue available literally right now if you reach the World Series or win one.
Therein lies the problem, however. Most owners don’t think, “I’m going to maximize my chances of winning a World Series while I know my team is good.” They think, “I’m going to maximize my future cost savings in excess prospect value.” Or, more directly, “in 2031, there’s a 15% chance that this player produces $6 million worth of production while we’re only paying him $3 million, so we can’t possibly trade him to increase our chances of winning this season, even though we already know we’re extremely good right now and don’t know what our team will look like in 2031”. Want to know what’s “ruining baseball?” That mindset right there.
The Dodgers don’t think like that, even though they’ve won two consecutive titles. Yes, partially because they have more money. But it’s not just that. It’s because they want to win, above all. How do we know? Because they spend a higher percentage of their revenue on payroll than almost anyone. They could easily, say, rake in their billions from ticket sales, television deals, advertising and merchandise, then simply…pocket it. They don’t have to spend $400 million on players to be popular in the massive, baseball-obsessed LA market, they choose to. Ownership wants to win, an apparent novelty in competitive sports, so they sacrifice hundreds of millions of dollars a year in increased profitability to boost their odds of doing so. They still turn a profit, to be sure, but just imagine how much more profit they’d make if they didn’t sign expensive players. That’s exactly what the Brewers, Rays, Pirates, Marlins, Nationals, and on and on and on would do.
Milwaukee could have traded for Skubal, sold out every game he pitched the rest of the season, meaningfully increased their World Series odds, and still had a top three farm system. They cheaped out, as they always do, hoping that they get there anyway…and still enjoy the all-important one true beautiful purpose of baseball: saving a little bit of money.
LA, meanwhile, said, this is a luxury that moves our current World Series odds from 25% to 25.5%, even if we sacrifice years of controllable talent and more profitability, and did it anyway. The Brewers might have increased their odds from 10% to 15%, and said no.
Obviously when it comes to free agency, only a handful of teams operate on a semi-level playing field at the top of the market. Along with the Dodgers, the Mets, Yankees, Giants, Cubs, Red Sox, Phillies, Rangers, Angels, and Astros all play in huge markets and can afford to spend big money on free agents if they so choose. But even LA’s spending doesn’t always work. Kyle Tucker received a gigantic contract this offseason and has been a below average hitter this year. Edwin Diaz, their other big acquisition, has missed most of the season with an arm injury and has a 9.00 ERA in eight innings. The Mets, of course, have a payroll close to the Dodgers, and are one of the worst teams in baseball.
Milwaukee’s not going to compete with the Dodgers to sign Skubal as a free agent. The point though, is that they could compete with the Dodgers on a level playing field to trade for him right now. When they already know their team is good and in position to earn a first round bye. They chose not to.
The Cubs, who play in one of the three largest markets, have a massive national fan base, sell out game after game, and are in position to play either the Brewers or Dodgers in the NLDS. They need pitching, with Cade Horton out and some shaky back-end rotation options. Shota Imanaga, Tarik Skubal, and their elite offense though, would make them extremely dangerous in a short series. Not to mention meaningfully increase their chances of winning a three-game wild card series against Philadelphia.
Instead? They sat on the sidelines and watched the Dodgers swoop in.
Again, none of this is to say that the Dodgers don’t have immense financial advantages. They absolutely do. This trade wasn’t about those advantages though. It was about LA’s front office and ownership group putting winning first. If the rest of the league cared about optimizing their chances of winning a championship instead of crying poor and pouting over giving up projected excess value, fans would have much less to complain about. A salary cap won’t fix cheap ownership, because the Brewers, Marlins, Pirates and so on will always spend the bare minimum. Whatever the floor is, those teams will spend one dollar more than that floor. Whatever the top end is, the Dodgers will spend at the top. Free agents would still choose LA, even if the financial offers are equal, because their owners will still do everything they can to win more games. While those other teams put profitability and buying that third yacht first.
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But maybe that’s the whole point anyway. Let uninformed fans complain and hope it leads to the ultimate and most cherished goal in the competitive sport they run: saving money.
