The Detroit Tigers drafted LHP Tarik Skubal in the 9th round of the 2018 MLB June Amateur Draft from Seattle University. Before his call up to the Major Leagues in 2020 Skubal had worked his way up the Tigers Prospect Board to become their No. 5 Overall Prospect in 2020; peaking at No. 4 in 2019.
Skubal’s time in the big leagues has not been pretty. He has accumulated a 2-11 record over 18 appearances (15 starts) with an ERA of 5.40 and WHIP of 1.38. He has thrown 75 innings surrendering 8.8 H/9 along with 3.7 BB/9 and 2.6 HR/9.
The numbers are not pretty, and I have heard a few fans grumbling about Skubal being a bust, but it is far too early for that. He is pitching for a team in the middle of what seems to be a never ending rebuild that struggles to provide any run support for its pitching staff on a regular basis. It is my belief that Skubal is starting to figure things out and will work his way into becoming a front of the rotation type pitcher.
The Stats (Starts Only)
As of today, 5/28/2021, Skubal has made 8 starts this season posting a 1-6 record. Thus far, he has thrown 37.1 innings allowing 38 hits and 23 ER while surrendering 10 HR walking 17 and striking out 44. Looking deeper he posted a 5.23 ERA (5.90 xERA) on the season along with a .236 BAA (.270 xBA) with a WHIP of 1.51. Batters have a HardHit% of 44.4 against him accompanied by a K rate of 25.1% and walk rate of 10.3%.
Overall, these numbers are not easy to read and from the outside and, to some fans, may seem as though Skubal is a bust. This is not the case.
Monthly Breakdown
In both April and May Skubal made a total of 4 starts for the Detroit Tigers. As you can see from the number above things have improved slightly. In April he averaged just over 4 IP per start and averaged just over 5 IP in May. He still surrenders about 1 hit per inning, but he cut his walk and HR totals nearly in half. He also more than doubled his strikeouts.
In April Skubal posted an ERA of 7.27 in his four starts and May dropped that down to 4.29 over four starts. His WHIP also dropped from 1.67 in April to 1.33 in May. One thing that I believe is important to note is that over his 8 starts Skubal has received only 11 total runs of support, 5 of which came during his start in Seattle on 5/19 where he earned his first win of the 2021 season. This means over the course of 7 starts he received a total of 6 runs of support; 4 of those 7 he received 0 runs; most significantly 5/7 and 5/25 during which he surrendered only 2 runs over 5 innings each.
The Arsenal
According to Baseball Savant Skubal had a 5-pitch mix of a 4-Seam Fastball, Slider, Knuckle Curve, Splitter and Cutter. Of the 826 total pitches thrown to date Skubal only threw 8 cutters (1%) and posted a .000 BAA in 2 at-bats, however, he used the splitter around 7.2% of the time (59 total pitches) and was rocked to the tune of a .333 BAA.
Over his first four starts it seems as though Skubal may have been somewhat predicable to opposing batters. In each of those starts he used his fastball nearly 54% of the time followed up by the slider 26% of the time, essentially rendering himself a 2-pitch pitcher. Moving forward to the month of May he chose to eliminate the cutter and splitter from his pitching arsenal and has gone to a 4-pitch mix of 4-seam fastball, changeup, slider, and knuckle curve. In eliminating the two pitches and adding the change he seemingly has become more efficient on the mound.
Overall, he has become more diverse on the mound with his pitch selection making him less predictable on the mound; fastballs 54%, off-speed 17% and breaking 29%. Skubal currently has a Whiff rate of 34.1% on his slider and 56% on the changeup. According to his Baseball Savant profile his 4-seam fastball and slider have remarkably similar spin rates, 2243 and 2159 RPM respectively, which, I believe, makes his slider extremely deceiving to opposing hitters especially with a nearly 10 MPH difference in velocity.
Skubal has a big-league caliber fastball, it is just the command that has been the issue. He currently ranges anywhere from 94-98 MPH with his 4-seam fastball but is currently surrendering a .315 BAA and 8 HR. I expect that with time he will find the command of the fastball and will be able to blow more batters away. To date batters have gone 10-for-52 against his breaking pitches, good for a .192 BAA and 19 of his 49 strikeouts of the season have come on the breaking ball as well. In fact, his slider (as mentioned before) has a Whiff rate of 34.1% and the curveball at 27.3%.
The most intriguing thing, to me, has been the use of his changeup. Since adding the pitch in May he has thrown a total of 65 all of which, except for 1 pitch, have come against right-handed batters. With the high Whiff% (56%) low BAA (.154) and the use of the pitch as a Put Away pitch 37.5% of the time why is he not throwing it to left-handed batters more often?
I am of the belief that Skubal is nearing the turning point at which everything will click, and we will see a breakout game from him. I believe that the numbers prove this. While he has struggled in his time with Detroit there is no reason to give up on him this early. There have been other pitchers who struggled to start their career, the likes of Spencer Turnbull (3-19), Zack Greinke (13-28) and Max Scherzer (9-15) to name a few.
I expect that we will see Skubal working deeper into games as we enter the month of June. He was unable to working beyond the 5th inning in 3 of his 4 starts in April but worked at least 5 innings in each of his 4 starts thus far in May. If he can work into the 6th inning and beyond and can get a little help from the offense, we should see his record (and other numbers) improve as the season goes on.
All Statistics are from Baseball Savant, MLB and Baseball Reference