It was reported earlier today that free agent Tarik Skubal is hoping to sign before the lockout arrives on December 2 and will meet with the Mets next week. Dodgers general manager Brandon Gomes said that his club has been in touch with Skubal and expects to have a meeting with him at some point in the near future as well. Jack Harris of The California Post was among those to relay the word from Gomes.
Skubal is the clear top free agent of the winter. MLBTR predicted him to secure a nine-year deal with a $425MM guarantee. That was more than $300MM clear of the prediction for every other free agent.
It’s possible that the expected lockout and accompanying transaction freeze will give a natural framework to the sweepstakes. With Skubal’s apparent preference to get a deal done before things go dark, he and his representatives at the Boras Corporation seem to be lining up meetings with potential suitors in the hopes of making progress on the bidding in the coming weeks.
It’s not at all surprising that the Dodgers would be involved. They are always interested when elite talent is available. They just acquired Skubal from the Tigers at the deadline a few months ago. Though the club was eliminated by the Brewers in the NLCS, that was certainly no fault of Skubal’s. He gave the Dodgers ten starts with a 2.61 earned run average after the trade. He then posted a 2.45 ERA in two postseason starts.
The rotation isn’t really a need in a strict sense. They have Shohei Ohtani, Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Tyler Glasnow and Blake Snell in four spots already. Emmet Sheehan, Justin Wrobleski and others are also available to help out.
But that was also the case at the deadline this year and the Dodgers went for the kill by adding Skubal anyway. They could do the same this offseason. They don’t really have strong needs outside the pitching staff. The lineup already features strong options for every position and they don’t even have room for top prospect Josue De Paula, which has led to speculation of a Teoscar Hernández trade.
The bullpen arguably needs more attention than the rotation, as the Dodgers just lost Alex Vesia, Evan Phillips, Kris Bubic, Blake Treinen and others to free agency. They could let Skubal sign elsewhere and focus on relief arms but no reliever projects to help the club in 2027 and beyond as much as Skubal can.
If Skubal is looking for a traditional long-term deal as MLBTR predicted, it would require the Dodgers to break their personal habits. They usually prefer shorter-term arrangements with higher average annual values. In the past decade, they have only gone beyond six years for a free agent twice, both under special circumstances. Yamamoto secured a 12-year deal when coming over from Japan but he was exceptionally young, going into his age-25 season. Ohtani got a ten-year deal but he is a unicorn talent and the contract had infamously extreme deferrals.
MLBTR’s Payroll Tracker projects the Dodgers for a cash/LRD payroll of $369MM next year and a competitive balance tax number of $388MM. The LRD number is already over 2026, as the Dodgers finished at $341MM, while the 2026 CBT number was up at $431MM. In recent years, it’s been hard to predict where the club is willing to go, as they have shown a huge willingness to keep cranking up the spending. Owner Mark Walter is having financial trouble at the moment and has been selling off other assets, but he and other bigwigs with the club continue to insist the Dodgers won’t be affected.
The Mets have similar preferences to the Dodgers. That club’s president of baseball operations David Stearns has never signed a free agent pitcher to a deal longer than three years. That includes his time running the Brewers as well as the Mets.
Perhaps those two clubs will try to pitch Skubal on creative short-term structures, as they both did with Kyle Tucker. But other teams are sure to get involved as well. The Padres have already been connected to the star lefty. The Blue Jays, Yankees, Red Sox and plenty of others could jump in. Skubal has posted an ERA under 3.00 in four straight seasons now. He won American League Cy Young honors in both 2024 and 2025. His 2026 was interrupted by an elbow surgery to remove a bone spur but he still managed to post a 2.72 ERA in 26 starts around that.
Photo courtesy of Jon Endow, Imagn Images
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