If we are measuring by comeuppance, the Detroit Tigers just fleeced the Los Angeles Dodgers in their trade of Tarik Skubal. If we’re measuring production, well, the Tigers could win that part of the trade, too.
Skubal and the Evil Empire’s season is done. Now the pitcher is a free agent. Milwaukee made sure of that after sweeping the defending champs Thursday, Oct. 15, kicking off a celebration for baseball fans everywhere.
No joy feels better than another person’s misery, at least if you’re a spurned and angry sports fan. No wonder so many Tigers fans felt nirvana watching Skubal suffer as he hung on the railing in the home dugout of Dodger Stadium, looking out at the Brewers celebrating their sweep of the team that traded for him.
He appeared
stunned, expressionless, still, and he held a baseball in his left hand, as if he were waiting to take the mound again for a game that was never going to come. He had his chance in Game 1 to open the NLCS in Milwaukee and couldn’t hold down the Brewers.
Not that it would have made a difference.
He didn’t make a difference in the regular season, either. Oh, the Dodgers went 8-2 in his starts after they acquired him at the trade deadline. But even if they’d lost every one of those starts, they still would’ve won the National League West division.
Which means they gave up OF Zyhir Hope, RHP River Ryan, and RHP Brady Smith for a pitcher they didn’t need. Not that it matters to the team with the game’s best farm system. Or its deepest pockets, though after what will almost certainly be a work stoppage, those deep pockets may not mean what they used to, and Skubal might not remain a Dodger.
Even if he does, the Dodgers will have to seriously pay him − and may have to use a considerable chunk of their salary cap, if the owners get their way and create one. Whatever shakes out, the Dodgers didn’t get what they wanted when they traded for Skubal:
A third straight World Series.
The Tigers, meanwhile, have hope, if you’ll pardon the pun. They have a few prospects with varying degrees of promise. They have the reasonable expectation that one of the three will make the big-league club roster next season and contribute.
If they’d held on to Skubal, they’d have nothing.
Now the Dodgers have nothing − at least in the context of the trade − and lost a series earlier than they had the last two seasons. So, yeah, that feels good to Tigers fans, and to baseball fans everywhere.
Not because they care about the Tigers, but because they care about comeuppance, the second-best feeling in sports.
And sometimes the first.
Contact Shawn Windsor: swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Dodgers are done, so did Detroit Tigers win the Tarik Skubal trade?
