Seattle —
Scott Harris, the president of baseball operations for the Detroit Tigers, has at least one thing in common with Riley Greene, the team’s 25-year-old former first round draft pick and three-time All-Star outfielder.
“I hate selling with every fiber of my body,” Harris told reporters a little more than an hour after the trade deadline on Monday night. “I absolutely hate it. I don’t want to be in a position where we’re selling in July.”
And yet, the Tigers sold in July, dealing their best two starters, including Tarik Skubal – two-time reigning Cy Young Award winner and the best pitcher in the American League dating back to the beginning of 2024 by any number of metrics (ERA, FIP, fWAR). Skubal was the prize of the deadline, a top-of-the-rotation talent deemed a difference maker by none other than the behemoth Los Angeles Dodgers.
This was very likely always going to be his last season in Detroit. In 2024 and 2025, Skubal had led the club to its first two postseason berths in nearly a decade. The hope was to get one more go at it before he departed in free agency.
