CHICAGO — The first fans booed Tarik Skubal at 6:22 p.m. CT, as he jogged on the outfield grass in front of the visitor’s bullpen at Wrigley Field. They booed him again, and louder than any of his new teammates, when the Los Angeles Dodgers’ lineup was announced. They booed more as Skubal stepped to the mound for his first start with a team, which also doubled as his first career start inside the “Friendly Confines.”
The two-time AL Cy Young Award winner was officially a villain, and he already knew it’s a feeling that will become familiar.
“I plan on pitching in front of those atmospheres for the rest of the season,” Skubal said. “I actually haven’t made a home start in the postseason. They’ve all been on the road. I’ve pitched in pretty good environments and I’d say that’s up there with any of those postseason starts.”
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The result of Skubal’s debut as a Dodger – a 5-1 Cubs win on Tuesday, Aug. 4 – wasn’t as significant as the sensation everyone involved left with once this highly anticipated regular-season game was over. The potential presented by Skubal’s overwhelming power, as well as the perils of being an overwhelming favorite, were on display for a sold-out crowd of more than 40,000 and a national television audience.
If this Los Angeles team is indeed ruining baseball en route to a third straight World Series championship and perhaps a lockout, it’ll only do so after taking the entire sport’s best shot.
“Everyone can’t play here for the Dodgers,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said of the pressure.
There is a target on these Dodgers unlike their past two predecessors that won titles, and it got bigger when they acquired the best pitcher in baseball. That reality confronted Skubal almost as soon as he walked inside Wrigley Field on Tuesday, even though he’s now another superstar on a roster filled with them.
A plane flew around the stadium a few hours before first pitch carrying a banner that read, “The Dodgers ruined baseball.” It was sponsored by Underdog Sports, a daily fantasy sports and predictions market operator. There was just one problem: The banner was upside down.
Skubal said he struggled to fall asleep Monday night. “It felt like my major league debut,” he explained. Roberts admitted before the game that Skubal “just wants to get this first one out of the way.”
“Yeah, it’s 1 of 162 but I do think Tarik Skubal making a start for the Dodgers is a big deal for baseball,” Roberts said of the moment.
So then Skubal struck out Cubs star Pete Crow-Armstrong looking with a 99 mph fastball to start the game. A solo home run by Dansby Swanson was the lone hit of substance he allowed before the sixth inning, even though his strike rate was the lowest it had been in three years. Then came a sequence seemingly set up for Skubal’s first fist-pumping, adrenaline-fueled celebration in a Dodgers uniform.
He had nearly escaped his only jam when he fired a four-seam fastball at the top of the strike zone that Nico Hoerner hit directly into the dirt. The ball traveled just one foot in the air, according to the official scorer, but then bounced so high into the Chicago night that Hoerner had nearly reached first base by the time it settled into the glove of Dodgers infielder Tommy Edman. A run scored, a 1-1 stalemate was broken, and the Cubs held on to deliver a fifth consecutive defeat for the Dodgers.
Skubal finished having pitched six innings and given up two runs on four hits, with six strikeouts, in his first game with the Dodgers. He was on the hook for the loss, but “there’s nothing he really throws that you can hit hard,” Hoerner said with a laugh.
That, of course, is why the Dodgers traded for Skubal. It’s why he could command $400 million as a free agent after this season.
It’s also why nobody is ready to make this easy on them.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: In his Dodgers debut, Tarik Skubal inherits baseball’s bullseye
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