PHILADELPHIA — The large number of teams that make Major League Baseball’s postseason field these days makes it harder to predict whether choice acquisitions such as left-handed pitcher Tarik Skubal of the Detroit Tigers will be dealt before the trade deadline for 2026 on Aug. 3.
Twenty-three of the 30 teams are within four games of one of the 12 playoff positions as the midseason break for the MLB All-Star Game, which took place Tuesday night at Philadelphia’s Citizens Bank Park, wraps up. There’s just one game Thursday — the Philadelphia Phillies, back in contention at second place in the National League East, host the woeful New York Mets, who are a distant last in the division — but Friday brings a full slate of action.
Team are approaching the 100-game mark in the 162-game regular season, which is set to conclude Sept. 27.
“You’ve got a lot of really good teams that were on the bubble that have gotten in and kind of made it,” Phillies first baseman Bryce Harper said. “Anybody that has an opportunity to get in, anything can happen, and that’s what makes our sport great.”
Skubal, a two-time American League Cy Young Award winner who can become a free agent after the World Series, is the most prominent possible trade bait. The 29-year-old is 2-3 with a 3.62 ERA in six starts since having surgery May 6 to remove a loose body from his pitching elbow.
He returned to the mound for Detroit on June 13 after Dr. Neal ElAttrache operated with a NanoNeedle scope 2.0, a miniaturized, flexible version of the traditional arthroscope.
Detroit was 22-38 at the start of June, or 16 games under .500. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, that figure stands as the lowest any team in MLB history has been before rebounding to reach the postseason, with the 1914 Boston Braves getting there after starting 12-28. Now the Tigers’ performance in 16 games before the deadline will help determine whether they are buyers or sellers.
Right-handed pitchers Freddy Peralta of the New York Mets and Joe Ryan of the Minnesota Twins also could become available. The Mets, who are 40-57 despite being among MLB’s biggest spenders, also could deal left-handed relievers A.J. Minter and Brooks Raley to contenders, while the similarly struggling San Francisco Giants of the NL West may try to jettison second baseman Luis Arraez.
Baseball’s only division leads of more than three games are held by the Los Angeles Dodgers (11 1/2 over the second-place Arizona Diamondbacks in the NL West) and the Milwaukee Brewers (five over the second-place Chicago Cubs in the NL Central).
“There are some middling teams that are potentially going to finish stronger, and some teams that are front-running right now that might fall back to the pack,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “It’s what the fans wanted. It keeps everyone involved through September, as many teams as possible.”
Just seven teams of the 30 teams are more than four games out of a wild-card berth: the Athletics (6 1/2), Kansas City Royals and Los Angeles Angels (10 each) in the AL, and the Cincinnati Reds (eight), Giants (10 1/2), Mets (12) and Colorado Rockies (13 1/2) in the NL.
“I think having more teams involved and more fan bases feeling like there’s something to play for later in the season is always good,” said Toronto Blue Jays right-hander Dylan Cease, the winning pitcher in the AL’s 4-0 win against the NL in Tuesday’s MLB All-Star Game.
Philadelphia, the two-time reigning NL East champion, fell to 9-19 when manager Rob Thomson was fired on April 28 and replaced by Don Mattingly. The Phillies are 44-24 since and trail the division-leading Atlanta Braves (55-40) by two games.
Harper thinks a key to the turnaround was when Zack Wheeler rejoined the rotation on April 25, completing his return after surgery last August for thoracic outlet syndrome. Wheeler is 10-1 with a 2.13 ERA.
“Once we got Wheels back, I think everybody kind of took a deep breath,” Harper said. “That helped a lot of our other starting pitching kind of just fall into place.”
Meanwhile in the AL East, the Boston Red Sox fired Alex Cora after a 10-17 start are 36-31 under Chad Tracy, ending the first half with their first 9-0 road trip since 1977.
Despite a 46-48 record, the Red Sox trail by just a half-game for the last wild card in the AL, which has just five teams currently with winning records.
“We’ve done a much better job overall with our approach,” Tracy said. “We’re taking more pitches. We’re seeing more pitches against starters. We are getting starters deep in counts earlier in games. We’re scoring runs in the first five innings of the game and letting our starting rotation pitch with a lead.”
If the Red Sox struggle in the next few weeks, closer Aroldis Chapman and starting pitcher Sonny Gray could get dealt.
Three of the four teams that had first-round byes last year advanced to league championship series: the Brewers and the Phillies in the NL, and the Seattle Mariners and the Blue Jays in the AL. Among the teams emerging from wild-card matchups, only the Dodgers won their division series. They went on to beat the Blue Jays in a World Series that went seven games and required extra innings in the decisive contest as Los Angeles repeated as MLB’s champion.
Having a first-round bey in the playoffs allows teams to reset their rotations and assure they opened the divisional round with their best starters.
New York Yankees pitcher Cam Schlittler thought back to his team losing the AL East title and the bye to Toronto on a tiebreaker last year.
“Every game matters,” he said.