Why offering Tarik Skubal $100 million for one season makes sense for Dodgers

LAS VEGAS – The Dodgers want Tarik Skubal back.They need him back.So pay him.Offer him a salary next year greater than Kyle Tucker’s last year.Or even Shohei Ohtani’s.If the uncertainty over potential future economic regulations give the Dodgers reservations about signing Skubal to a long-term contract, present him with a deal that would pay him more money than any player has ever made in a single season.Eighty million dollars.Ninety million.One-hundred million.Whatever necessary.The Dodgers like to talk about the importance of reading and reacting to various situations, and that’s what their efforts to re-sign two-time Cy Young Award winner call for them to do.As the baseball industry gathered Monday on the Las Vegas Strip for the general managers meetings this week, teams didn’t know the rules under which they would be playing next season, whether there will be a salary cap or some other form of cost control designed to increase franchise valuations.The prospect of a salary cap or some other form of cost control in the next collective-bargaining agreement could make the Dodgers reluctant to sign Skubal to the kind of eight- to 10-year contract he figures to command on the open market.As it is, the Dodgers already have a number of long-term commitments on their books.Yoshinobu Yamamoto is under contract through 2035, Ohtani and Will Smith through 2033, Mookie Betts through 2032, Tucker and Blake Snell through 2029.But in its most recent CBA proposal, Major League Baseball offered to delay the implementation of a salary cap until 2028 and said in a news release that it “is willing to discuss additional appropriate phase-in timeline & procedures for implementation of the Salary Cap and Floor.”While the pitch was quickly rejected by the players, it confirmed that even if extreme changes are introduced, teams will likely be granted time to make their rosters salary-cap compliant.The Dodgers have to take advantage of that grace period.Signing Skubal t...