MLB insider names nightmare Tigers suitor for Tarik Skubal who might be worse than Dodgers

It's hardly surprising when an insider names yet another contender who plans to give the Tigers a call about Tarik Skubal at the trade deadline. There are the Dodgers (as always), the Yankees, the Phillies, the Brewers, the Braves (currently thought to be the favorites, surprisingly), even the Rays. As frustrating as it is for Tigers fan to watch the vultures circle, we can't really begrudge them. Any team with a real shot at winning the World Series and a healthy-ish farm system has to give it a shot.

It is a little more surprising, though, when a fringe team is thrown into the mix. The commonalities between all of the aforementioned teams is that they all have winning percentages well over .500 and are either first of second in their respective divisions.

The Astros, who Bob Nightengale wrote "plan to be in the Tarik Skubal and Sonny Gray sweepstakes," are .489 entering play on Monday and are third place in the AL West.

But such is life in the American League in 2026. If the postseason started on Monday, the .500 Rangers would get the last Wild Card spot. The Astros are just one game behind. The Tigers, even with the third-worst record in the league, are just five games behind.

Just because the Astros plan to be in on the sweepstakes doesn't mean they have a good shot at winning. But even the thought of Skubal going to the Astros almost a decade after Justin Verlander was dealt there might be too much for Tigers fans to bear.

Bob Nightengale names Astros as another lurking suitor for Tarik Skubal

The very idea of losing Skubal is something that we're still trying to wrap our heads around — but losing him to the very team that won the World Series just months after they won the trade for Verlander? If that kind of history were to repeat itself, it might break some Tigers fans permanently.

Houston very well might fall out of their current position in Wild Card picture within a couple of weeks, but the mediocrity of the AL makes it impossible to fit almost the entire league into clean buyer-seller roles right now. The real question is whether or not the Astros can actually afford Skubal, and our guess is that they can't.

Not only do they have one of the weakest farm systems in baseball this year, we'd guess that they'll also lack the conviction to deal even their most valuable prospects when push comes to shove. If we were the Astros, we'd find it really hard to justify hurting an already suffering farm system for a rental when the rest of the roster has not made itself look like a real World Series — or even just postseason — threat.

Still, the thought is enough to keep you up at night. Even watching the Dodgers get even richer might hurt less than Skubal going to Houston.

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