What is the story about?
Happy Wednesday, everyone. Unless, of course, you’re the Detroit Tigers. The Tigers—who had already lost several pitchers to the IL—are losing their ace, Tarik Skubal, to surgery to remove loose bodies from his elbow. It’s creating a lot of questions for how the Tigers will proceed as the AL Central becomes unexpectedly tight, and it also raises questions about how both the trade deadline and free agency are going to work.
We’ve got more on that below, as well as some updates from all over baseball,
so let’s just get right into it.
- Tarik Skubal, a two-time Cy Young winner, is slated to miss 2-3 months for surgery, which is bad news for the Tigers and also for Skubal. Mark Feinsand looks at how this will impact Detroit and Skubal’s free agency.
- Ben Clemens looks at how the tight race in the AL Central will just become harder for the Tigers now that they’ve lost Skubal.
- Kyle Koster explains that the Tigers will once again need to embrace an old technique: pitching chaos.
- Stephanie Apstein thinks the Skubal injury is going to lead to a much more active trade deadline.
- Brian Murphy shares that George Springer has finally made his return to the Blue Jays.
- Zack Meisel talks to superstar batters about which pitchers are their nemesis. (The Athletic subscription required.)
- A very cool event for Red Sox fans.
- Ildemaro Vargas is suddenly a hitting machine, shares Jay Jaffe.
- Dan Szymborski wonders if the NL East race is already over.
- But not so fast, as the Braves just sent Ronald Acuña Jr. to the IL. Story by Ryan Blake.
- Tim Capurso explains how the ABS system is moving over to college baseball.
- Ken Rosenthal wonders if the Braves’ Drake Baldwin can help raise the bar for catcher salaries. (The Athletic subscription required.)
- Lauren Green looks at the mental health issues that took Jackson Olson out of commission for the Savannah Bananas, and how happy he was to return.
- Chris Devenski was suspended for two games for intentionally throwing at Sal Stewart of the Reds. (AP)
- Fabian Ardaya reports that Shohei Ohtani once again won’t hit in a game where he’s starting pitcher. (The Athletic subscription required.)
- This is certainly one way to look at the positives of a rainy game.
- Michael Baumann looks at the Yankees’ decision to option a rehabbed Anthony Volpe right back to Triple-A.
- Jared Greenspan rounds up the top players of the season (so far).
- Jim Bowden looks at the next generation of pitching aces starting to emerge. (The Athletic subscription required.)
- Jason Foster looks at the first MVP poll of the season, which has the usual suspects, but also some fun surprises.
- Kyle Koster suggests we might see the first hitting Triple Crown since 2012 this season.
- A man was fatally stabbed outside of the Cardinals’ stadium. (AP)
- A really sad day for Yankees fans as one of their all-time great broadcasters has passed. The Yankees will wear a patch to honor Sterling.
And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster. Make it so.
