Exclusive | Tarik Skubal wants to be great; Clayton Kershaw spits facts on Dodgers ace

Because Tarik Skubal returned to the Detroit Tigers’ spring training camp after making just one start in the World Baseball Classic this year, Clayton Kershaw didn’t spend as much time with him as he did with Team USA’s other players.But in the little more than a week in which they shared a clubhouse, Kershaw said Skubal made it obvious what he was about.“He wants to be great,” Kershaw told The California Post.Kershaw, who temporarily came out of retirement to be on Team USA, said everything Skubal did reflected the scale of his ambition.“I think that comes out in how he talks and how he prepares,” Kershaw said.“You can tell he wants to be the best.”Something else: Skubal asked a lot of questions.“He’s very confident in what he does well, but he really likes to ask guys and hear how other people do it,” Kershaw said.

“I just think it’s a really good quality to be interested in what other people are doing.”From Skubal’s vantage point, Kershaw was a former Most Valuable Player, a three-time Cy Young Award winner and a three-time World Series champion.Why wouldn’t Skubal use him as a resource?“He’s the best left-hander ever, right?” said Skubal, himself a two-time Cy Young Award winner.

“Obviously, that was a great opportunity for me to pick [his] brain and talk about what made him tick, what made him so good, his process, all that kind of stuff.I want to accomplish all the same things he’s been able to accomplish.

I’ll probably keep most of what we talked about between me and him, but as far as the questions that I asked, they were very much [about] how to be great, how to be like him.”Skubal pitched six innings in a 6-2 loss to the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday in his third start for the Dodgers, who acquired him two days before the trade deadline.He wasn’t great.Skubal gave up seven hits and walked two.His pitch count was at 48 after just two innings, departing with a 2-1 deficit and ultimately falling to 0-2 as a ...