This article is presented by Antonio’s Italian Cucina

We need to take a moment to appreciate the historic run that Tarik Skubal is currently on.

It’s not every day that we see a player in any sport be literally untouchable.

Tarik Skubal, 12th K…32 Swings and Misses.

“I’m tired” 🤣 pic.twitter.com/7dRrJ8QgD4

— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) May 10, 2025

It’s rare to see them like that in just one game, let alone weeks on end. And that is exactly what Tarik Skubal is doing right now. To put it bluntly, Scooby is fucking shoving right now and there’s not a pitcher in baseball who has been even close over his last six starts. 

Over his last six starts, going back to April 8th, Skubal has been on a tear that we haven’t seen in Detroit, maybe ever. He had two slow starts to the season by some people’s standards, but has since posted a 5-1 record, .97 ERA, OPS of .424, 50 strikeouts and 1 walk. Let me reiterate, across 133 at-bats and 37 innings, he’s struck out 50 batters and only walked one. That’s fucking insane! 

Tarik Skubal just became the first pitcher in MLB history to strike out more than 40 batters in a 6-start stretch without allowing more than 4 runs total and without walking more than 1 batter.

And he didn’t stop at 40 Ks. He struck out 50!

It’s completely ridiculous. pic.twitter.com/nX4I6UqN0u

— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) May 10, 2025

If you don’t quite realize how crazy this stretch is, I dug up some other dominant stretches from Detroit athletes to see how they compare. This is what I came up with… 

Across 8 games in 1997, Barry Sanders rushed for 171 yards per game for a total of 1,368 yards, 11 touchdowns, and had a crazy 6.5 yards per carry. This is arguably the best 2-month stretch by a running back in NFL history. And it still doesn’t compare to Tarik’s month. 

In 2012, Miguel Cabrera finished the final two months of the year hitting .357, 16 home runs, 44 RBIs and an OPS of 1.108. This won him the Triple Crown and led the Tigers to a 20-13 record over this span. This run is closer to Tarik’s, but we’ve seen batters get hot before. Also, Miggy is one of the best hitters of all-time. 

Comparing apples to apples, Justin Verlander had an eight game stretch from August to September in 2011 in which he went 7-0 with an ERA of 1.27 and 65 strikeouts across 56.2 innings. Tigers went on a 12 game winning streak and JV locked up the Cy Young and MVP during this time, but Tarik is destroying these numbers. 

Finally, from December of ‘93 to January of ‘94, Sergei Fedorov put up a 20 game stretch where he had 16 goals and 21 assists, good for 37 total points. Dominant, but not close to Scooby. 

So take it in, Detroit. Run, don’t walk, to Tarik’s next start because a dominant run like this doesn’t happen every day. Oh and by the way, if you’re reading this Chris Illitch, you shoulda paid Skubal last offseason. The best pitcher in the world just got a whole lot more expensive.