Tarik Skubal's latest viral Tigers slight is a bad look for players as CBA talks loom

No one actually cared that Tarik Skubal took his espresso machine from the Tigers clubhouse after he was traded to the Dodgers, even if some fans wanted to add it to the list of make-believe sins he'd committed against the team that made him. Tigers players feigned heartbreak — Spencer Torkelson said, "Couldn't believe it. That was a really good espresso machine" — but it was all in good fun.

Skubal's otherwise done and said all the right things since he was traded. He choked up while talking about his former teammates during his first media appearance in LA and professed his desire for the Tigers to be involved in his free agency.

His latest slight, however, didn't come directly from him, and this one is a little more weighty than him taking a coffee machine he bought for himself.

In an interview on Foul Territory, new teammate Max Muncy said that Skubal was particularly taken by the fact that Dodgers players have their own plane, "especially because the rumor we had heard from Detroit was ... they have a new plane now, but the old plane couldn't fly cross-country, they had to stop halfway and refill."

No matter where you stand on the salary cap, the lockout, CBA talks, etc., it's hard to deny that this is a bad look for players.

Tarik Skubal's seemingly innocuous comments on Tigers' amenities are a bad look for players with labor talks ongoing

The players obviously have no control over what kind of plane they fly in, and the fact that the Tigers were in an older plane for a long time is on ownership, but let's thing about that statement for a second. Is millionaires complaining about their private plane really going to connect with fans, most of whom are already very much on the owners' side in terms of a salary cap?

MLB and the Players Association does care about what the fans think of them, whether or not that's going to dictate how they negotiate in December. Why else would MLB run quasi-political TV ads touting how many fans are already in favor of a cap? No matter the outcome of negotiations, MLB and its players will need to find a way to reconcile with fans if a lockout eats up a large chunk of the season.

No doubt Skubal shared this wonderment with Muncy and his Dodgers teammates assuming it wouldn't leave their circle, but Muncy probably also should've known better than to share it thinking that it was just a fun little anecdote.

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