In 2024, Tarik Skubal received the American League Cy Younger. It was unanimous, and deservedly so. Nonetheless many superlatives you possibly can consider for his manufacturing, he most likely deserved them. He shouldered a heavy workload, mixed devastating motion and velocity with nice command, and led the Tigers to the playoffs within the discount. It’s the form of 12 months that stands as the very best season of many gamers’ careers.
That may sound like I’m calling Skubal a one hit marvel, however I’m completely not. We projected him to be the very best pitcher in baseball earlier than the season began. We additionally projected him to strike out fewer batters, stroll extra, enable extra dwelling runs, and put up the next ERA and FIP than he did in 2024. You will be nice and nonetheless worse than Skubal was in 2024. In actual fact, nearly all nice pitchers are worse than he was final 12 months. It’s onerous to be that good!
You’ll observe that I didn’t say it’s unattainable to be that good. That’s as a result of, uh, have you ever seen Tarik Skubal pitch this 12 months? His statistics sound nearly made up. He’s the category of baseball, very clearly the very best pitcher within the recreation this 12 months. After all, in the event you’ve saved up with our leaderboards and watched highlights, I’m not telling you something new. However on the event of the very best recreation of Skubal’s profession, I believed it will be enjoyable to dig into his marvelous season and simply admire it for a bit. Tarik Skubal is the whole lot, in all places, . His 2025 is the very best in each means it’s attainable to be the very best. We don’t at all times have to wonder if one thing is sustainable. Generally we will simply recognize it.
The best factor about Skubal’s 2025, no less than in my view? His single-minded pursuit of effectivity. For guys like Skubal, the worst results of a pitch is normally a ball. When hitters chase, he’s clearly doing effectively. When he throws a pitch within the strike zone, he’s comically dominant. Hitters are arising empty very incessantly after they swing at pitches within the zone, and even after they make contact, that’s not the tip of the world for Skubal. Most of that contact is foul, and further bases aren’t notably devastating for him as a result of he permits so few baserunners. However a ball doesn’t give him an opportunity for any of the great outcomes. It simply will increase his pitch rely, with an opportunity of additionally strolling the runner and juicing the bases. That creates the likelihood for cascading failure – runners on base make pitches within the strike zone extra harmful, however pitches outdoors the strike zone may put even extra runners on base, and so forth.
Not everybody may get away with this, after all. Throw a middling sinker like Skubal throws his top-shelf providing and it will get tattooed. However when you’ve his heavy-duty fastball and nasty secondaries, attacking the zone is strictly good. You may see it in Skubal’s previous outcomes, in actual fact. From 2020 via 2022, round 35% of the pitches he threw resulted in referred to as balls. There’s nothing notably incorrect with that – that’s mainly league common – however Tarik Skubal and league common don’t belong in the identical sentence. That’s how he posted an ERA within the mid-4.00s in these years regardless of the eye-watering stuff that you just now affiliate with him.
In 2023, Skubal began to bear down. He threw within the zone extra incessantly. When he danced off the plate, he did so in conditions the place hitters had been extra more likely to swing, and in addition received them to swing extra incessantly by sharpening the break on his pitches and finding them higher. His charge of balls fell to 30.6% as he broke out over 15 scintillating begins in an injury-shortened season. He held that charge final 12 months, throwing 30.7% balls en path to his Cy Younger win.
That’s a dominant mark. It was the third-lowest charge of balls (or third-highest charge of “strikes,” together with balls in play, in the event you’d want) amongst starters. Solely Bryan Woo and Spencer Schwellenbach, famous paragons of command, did higher. Should you’re on the lookout for a little bit historic context, my private listing of the very best starters of the pitch monitoring period begins with Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, Clayton Kershaw, Chris Sale, and Jacob deGrom. Every of them has a profession referred to as ball charge between 32.4% and 34%. At their easiest, they every produced seasons like Skubal’s 2024, within the low 30s or excessive higher 20s, but another excuse that it felt like a profession 12 months.
Okay, now let me let you know about 2025. You thought 30% was good? How about 28.7%, Skubal’s league-leading mark this 12 months? He’s pouring in strikes at a charge that claims “right here, hit this” like he is aware of they received’t. And, effectively, he is aware of they received’t! Let’s think about the worst case for a pitcher: They throw their fastball over the center of the plate, and the batter swings at it. It’s essentially the most hittable pitch in baseball thrown to essentially the most hittable location in baseball. That is the place hitters make their paychecks.
Hitters don’t miss these pitches fairly often. Their whiff charge – swings that both miss or produce a foul tip – is just 13.5%. In different phrases, they put the ball in play a ton, and do a ton of injury after they do. That’s in opposition to mortals, although. Listed below are the pitchers who beat batters most incessantly with these middle-middle fastballs:
Center-Center Whiff Price On Fastballs, 2025
That’s a bunch of the very best pitchers in baseball, most of whom throw solely four-seamers. In the meantime, Skubal is on there though roughly half of his fastballs are sinkers. That’s a part of his magic: He can bombard the zone as a result of he’s onerous to deal with even when he engages with hitters on their turf. A few of the guys on there have the very best fastballs in baseball. Skubal belongs in that group.
As Thomas Harrington identified, Skubal’s four-seamer has gotten higher this 12 months. He’s throwing more durable and inducing extra vertical break, which has pushed him to the very best whiff charge within the majors on that pitch. When he locates it on the high of the zone, there’s nothing opposing hitters can do. And, effectively:
That’s just about excellent for somebody like Skubal. He goals for the highest of the zone, and if he misses, he misses over the plate. Until he’s on the lookout for weak contact, after all. In that case, he simply dials up his sinker, a 98 mph missile that jams righties inside and nearly by no means misses the zone; it has a preposterous 67% zone charge. Significantly, this chart is online game stuff:
You may assume I’ve captured Skubal with this text thus far. He throws fewer balls than anybody else in baseball, and he can try this as a result of he has two explosive fastballs that he throws within the zone with inhumanly correct placement. However whereas these two issues are true, they go away one thing out. They omit half of his pitches, in actual fact: Taken collectively, Skubal throws his two fastballs a mere 53% of the time.
Skubal’s most used pitch this 12 months isn’t both of these, it’s his Bugs Bunny changeup. That descriptor is normally saved for curveballs, but when Bugs threw a changeup, it will appear to be Skubal’s. It travels 53 ft wanting like a 90 mph fastball, however then it falls right into a tiny, localized black gap. The place’d it go? Sal Frelick actually couldn’t let you know:
That’s a ridiculous pitch. It’s 90 mph with an optical phantasm strapped on. The velocity and form are a pc program’s dream. Our two pitch-level fashions don’t agree on changeups all that always, as a result of there are plenty of methods to throw a great changeup, and simply as some ways to throw a foul one. However each fashions agree: Skubal’s is the category of the most important leagues. It will get on hitters immediately and falls 17 inches greater than his fastball, though his supply makes it look precisely like a fastball.
The superlatives are countless. Hitters swing and miss on 29.7% of the changeups he throws. Not 29.7% of those they swing at – 29.7% total, counting the whole lot. They arrive up empty on precisely half of their swings. His 94 swinging strikes on changeups are essentially the most in baseball by loads – he’s 17 forward of Cristopher Sánchez in second place. Within the state of affairs the place he makes use of it most – two strikes to righties – he’s deadly. He’s ended at-bats on that pitch a full third of the time he throws it, the very best mark in baseball, and it’s not notably shut.
Armed with that unhittable weapon, he assaults the strike zone fairly a bit. He additionally wields it like a surgeon with a scalpel. Right here’s the place he throws it early within the rely:
Low and away from righties, however positively within the zone. You couldn’t do a lot better in the event you had been enjoying a online game. With two strikes, he ventures off the plate simply sufficient to entice dangerous swings:
Our pitch modeling metrics separate stuff and site. After I informed you that they thought of Skubal’s changeup the category of the most important leagues, I used to be speaking concerning the stuff grade. Ignoring location, not contemplating something about that exact pitcher’s command, it’s the very best changeup in baseball. However he’s additionally top-of-the-line pitchers in baseball relating to changeup command. He’s within the high seven per PitchingBot, and the highest three per Stuff+. Put all of it collectively, and this pitch is straight up ludicrous.
I haven’t even gotten into his slider, a plus pitch of its personal that he breaks out to assault lefties. At 90 mph, it’s sharp and quick, with sufficient wiggle to make hitters look foolish. However I’ll cease there. That’s as a result of if I didn’t cease myself someplace, I may write about Skubal for days. In terms of attacking along with his fastball, he’s most likely the very best within the recreation. He additionally has the very best changeup within the recreation, or possibly even the very best secondary pitch within the recreation, interval. All of it works so effectively, and he is aware of all of it works so effectively, that he’s utilizing these expertise to pour in pitches, letting him work deeper into video games.
On Sunday, that every one got here to a head. Skubal struck out 13 in a dominant shutout of the Guardians, permitting solely two hits and no walks. Oh, and he did it on 94 pitches, an unbelievably environment friendly outing. His 13 strikeouts in a Maddux – a whole recreation with fewer than 100 pitches – is a brand new all-time file, surpassing a embellished trio headlined by Sandy Koufax. He did it the way in which he’s pitched all season, only a shade higher: overwhelming, untouchable, filling the zone with impending doom.
Is that this simply who Tarik Skubal is now? I don’t assume so. Nobody’s fairly this good for all that lengthy. However who cares? That hasn’t occurred but. Proper now, Tarik Skubal is pitching out of his thoughts. He’s pitching in addition to I’ve seen anybody pitch – not essentially higher than peak Pedro or deGrom, however actually on their stage. The subsequent large query is how lengthy he can stick with it – as a result of proper now, he’s doing it in addition to it may be accomplished.