Scout who found Tarik Skubal saw 'talent plus makeup' long before Detroit Tigers drafted him

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Scout who found Tarik Skubal saw 'talent plus makeup' long before Detroit Tigers drafted him

Evan Petzold, Detroit Free Press · Detroit Free Press

Thu, Sep 21, 2023 ·

9 min read

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When Dave Dangler is ready to learn more, he asks each player he scouts a four-part question. He measures their answers on a scale of 1-10 — one is low, 10 is high — and fact-checks their responses with their coaches.

The four-part evaluation from the longtime scout: How would you rate your work habits? How would you rate your confidence in your abilities? How would you rate yourself as a competitor? How would you rate your determination to be a major leaguer?

A college-aged Tarik Skubal answered with 10s across the board.

"I had a good feeling about this guy," said Dangler, now 73 years old. "He gave me good answers. He was mature. I had no reservation about his makeup. When you have talent plus makeup, that's a good deal."

Skubal, a former ninth-round pick by the Detroit Tigers , has a 3.25 ERA with 13 walks and 84 strikeouts over 69⅓ innings in 13 starts in the 2023 season. The 26-year-old, who turns 27 in late November, missed the first half of the season rehabbing from left flexor tendon surgery.

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Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Tarik Skubal throws to a Los Angeles Angels batter during the first inning at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, California, on Friday, Sept. 15, 2023.

It wasn't the first time Skubal recovered from major arm surgery.

In 2016, while at Seattle University, the hard-throwing college sophomore underwent Tommy John surgery to reconstruct the ulnar collateral ligament in his left elbow and didn't return to the mound until 2018.

Skubal, as long as he stays healthy, should be one of the best pitchers in baseball in the 2024 season.

"I kind of expect Skubal to be a monster every time," Tigers manager A.J. Hinch said July 5, the day Skubal returned from flexor tendon surgery . "The best part was how much he harnessed his emotions. ... But I expect him to be great. He's one of the best pitchers in baseball, quite honestly, when he's right."

Dangler remembers watching Skubal pitch for the first time in 2016. Skubal's brown hair was slicked back and grown out to his shoulders in the college years. Seattle head coach Donny Harrel and pitching coach Elliott Cribby thought Skubal would develop into a professional pitcher, so they gave the Tigers' Pacific Northwest area scout a nudge. The left-hander didn't jump off the page from the onset of Dangler's visits, though, hitting just 88-89 mph on the radar gun.

Dangler figured something wasn't right.

After the next two starts, Skubal stopped pitching due to an arm injury. He underwent Tommy John surgery and didn't return to the mound until Feb. 2, 2018. His final pre-surgery start occurred April 10, 2016, at North Dakota.

"That's the start of it," Dangler said. "Then, he comes back from Tommy John surgery."

For Skubal, the 2018 season was a tale of two halves. In the first half, he sprayed balls all around the strike zone and struggled to pitch inside the zone, walking more batters than he struck out. The scouts in the Pacific Northwest understood Skubal's potential, but poor performances — 33 walks over 25⅔ innings in his first eight games — shattered his draft stock.

Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Tarik Skubal wipes his face during the first inning of a baseball game against the Chicago White Sox at Guaranteed Rate Field in Chicago on Sunday, Sept. 3, 2023.

Although some scouts backed off, Dangler penned a reminder to himself in his scouting report: Need to see this guy again in three weeks to a month. In the meantime, he spent time talking to Cribby about Skubal's mechanical adjustments.

"I thought he was rolling off on his front side," Dangler said. "You have to be directionally linear to the plate because the plate never moves. When he would throw, I thought his front shoulder and front side would peel off toward the third-base line."

By the second half of the season, Skubal reclaimed his mid-90s fastball velocity, started filling up the strike zone and looked like a diamond in the rough.

As promised, Dangler made another trip to Seattle University.

Dangler kept scouting Skubal because of his professional philosophy. His scouting career began in 1999 with the Montreal Expos, and he was taught to scout the players he liked at least three times: once at the beginning of the season, once at the middle of the season and once at the end of the season.

Dangler, in his established career, has scouted for the Expos, Florida Marlins , Baltimore Orioles , Tigers and Philadelphia Phillies , along with serving as the pitching coach for Notre Dame and Washington.

The Tigers hired Dangler in November 2015 and fired him in September 2021. By February 2022, he latched on with the Phillies, for whom he still works, to continue his scouting career.

"I've gone back to see high school players that I'm not sure about as many as five or six times, just to make sure I get them right," Dangler said. "That's what my job is as a scout. I've got to do that with conviction. If I'm not sure, I'm going to keep watching to make sure that I am sure."

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Skubal's second-half turnaround culminated in the 2018 Western Athletic Conference tournament.

West Coast crosschecker Marti Wolever — Dangler's supervisor at the time — attended the tournament and watched Skubal face Northern Colorado in May 2018. He allowed one unearned run on four hits and one walk with 10 strikeouts across six innings.

"He was throwing like 94-95 mph," Dangler said, "might have touched 96."

A couple of weeks later, the Tigers were on the clock with the No. 255 overall pick in the 2018 draft. They were considering a few players for their ninth-round selection when Wolever, now a national crosschecker for the Chicago Cubs , spoke up about Skubal. He highlighted his imposing 6-foot-4 stature, reconstructed left elbow, 95 mph fastball, high-strikeout potential and incredible makeup.

The Tigers drafted Skubal.

Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Tarik Skubal (29) pitches against the Boston Red Sox during the first inning at Fenway Park in Boston on Friday, Aug. 11, 2023.

"The rest is kind of history," Dangler said.

Here's what else Dangler told the Free Press about scouting Skubal:

The first time you watched Skubal pitch, what did you see?

"The first thing you see is a left-hander with size, which is a good deal because 6-foot-4 left-handers are probably more desirable than 6-foot left-handers. The next thing you look at is the delivery and the arm action. Arm action is a real key. Hopefully, it's smooth. It's not how hard you can throw, it's how easy you can throw hard. He had all those attributes to get started when I first saw him."

How did you evaluate Skubal's arsenal in 2016 and 2018?

"The second grading scale is, there's a lot of guys that have fastballs. Major-league hitters can hit fastballs. I don't care how hard you can throw. If you throw 103 (mph), they can still hit it. What you got to do is disrupt their rhythm and/or their timing. You have to have some kind of breaking ball, and if you're going to be a starter, you probably need a changeup, as well. You got a three-pitch mix, then how good are those? He had, and has, a breaking ball. He had, and has, a changeup. ... When I would sit and talk with him to get the makeup, I ask every pitcher to show me the pitches they throw and the grips they use."

How did you apply your professional philosophies when scouting Skubal?

"One of my early, early bosses told me this: When you walk into a ballpark and a right-handed pitcher is starting, you say, 'No, no, no' until the right-handed pitcher makes you say, 'Yes, yes, yes.' If it's a left-handed pitcher, you say, 'Yes, yes, yes' until he makes you say, 'No.' Skubal is left-handed. He's got size. Previously, he had thrown 90-93 (mph). He struck out a bunch of guys. What's the reason you wouldn't go back to that? You keep scouting guys. I've had multiple guys that have been one thing at the beginning of the year and completely different at the end of the year, both positive and negative."

You gave a lot of credit to Marti Wolever for his role in drafting and signing Skubal. How do you describe your role in the process?

"You're watching guys, and you have to write reports. Every time you see a guy, you have to amend that report and add a little something. It's just, this is what this guy is, this is where I project him, and this is what the fastball is. ... I'm not there to pound on the table and say, 'Let's think about Skubal.' My job as an area scout is to provide a menu. I provide a menu of baseball players from the Pacific Northwest high schools and colleges. Whether the Tigers ordered off that menu is dependent upon people that are higher than me. I found the guy, if that's the right way to say it, and I put him on the menu in this spot, and then Marti Wolever is the guy that stepped up in the meeting in Lakeland and said, 'Let's place an order.'"

Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Tarik Skubal (29) watches game action against the Los Angeles Angels during the sixth inning at Angel Stadium in Anaheim, California, on Friday, Sept. 15, 2023.

After asking Skubal the four-part question, were you able to get a feel for whether he was telling the truth?

"I went to the coaching staff. I hired the head coach at Seattle University (Donny Harrel) to be my assistant one year (at Washington), and I knew the pitching coach there. I went to the pitching coach (Elliott Cribby) and asked about Skubal. What kind of worker is he? 'Oh, he's the hardest worker on the pitching staff.' What kind of a competitor is he? 'He's a big competitor, hates to lose.' All that stuff he said to me was reiterated by the coaching staff. Obviously, there are a lot of other questions. After my first impressions, you're probably a pretty good judge of people because you've met so many."

What do you think Skubal can be for the Tigers in the future?

"If I was projecting ahead, of course, you never know what's going to happen, especially with pitchers, but the path that he's on right now is a very, very good one. One of the keys to being a good starter and lasting a long time in the major leagues is consistency. It appears to me that he's putting together consistent starts. I would expect that for the rest of the year. Knowing the kid, that's not going to change in the future. I think he's going to be good for the rest of the year, and I think next year, he's going to be as good or better. He'll keep getting better. I could see him pitching for the Tigers for the next 10 years, easily."

Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold .

Listen to our weekly Tigers show "Days of Roar" every Monday afternoon on demand at freep.com, Apple Podcasts , Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. And catch all of our podcasts and daily voice briefing at freep.com/podcasts .

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Detroit Tigers scout who found Tarik Skubal saw 'talent plus makeup'

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