Heated exchange rises between Vasil, Skubal after 5th-inning strikeout

DETROIT – Why was Tigers ace Tarik Skubal yelling at Mike Vasil after striking out White Sox third baseman Colson Montgomery to strand the bases loaded in the top of the fifth inning Friday night at Comerica Park?

It’s an interesting point of focus, considering the Tigers emerged with a hard-fought 4-3 victory over the White Sox, dropping the South Siders to 39-35 overall and 1-3 on this current six-game road trip. And in talking to the parties involved postgame, the answer still doesn’t appear to have been completely revealed.

“Umm, it was good clean fun. Just two teams competing,” said a smiling Vasil. “I was up there on the top step and helping the team out, cheering them on. Next thing I know, I’m getting reamed out.”

"I'm a competitive guy,” Skubal said. “I kind of wear my emotions out there and that's part of how I play the game. It's just baseball, going back and forth. It is what it is. It happened. It's over with."

“Everything that Mike does, everything that we do on our bench is inward, it's above board,” White Sox manager Will Venable said. “My guess is there's some thought there's some sign stealing or something potentially. I don't know. You have to ask them.”

For those handful who aren’t familiar with Vasil’s work with the White Sox, let’s begin with his 2.50 ERA posted over 47 games and 101 innings during the 2025 season as a Rule 5 Draft addition. He underwent Tommy John surgery during this past Spring Training, but Vasil’s positivity was such a force that White Sox teammates pushed Venable to keep Vasil with the crew as the season progressed.

Shortly thereafter, on April 27, to be exact, Vasil’s magic wand took root in the dugout after fellow reliever Jordan Leasure spent $20 and had Amazon overnight it. A special wizard’s hat has been added, worn only after home runs, but that sort of fun didn’t seem to be the issue in this series opener.

“Look, I’ve always said I’m going to help the team and do everything I can to do it,” Vasil said. “I’m going to be with the guy in the box. We’ve seen far worse things in the game. If we are going to be that paranoid about it, it’s just part of the game.”

“We had two umpires come over talking to us and no one talking to their side when it was their guy on the mound that was yelling and causing a scene,” Venable said. “For us, we're just trying to get through it, explain to them that there was nothing going on. Didn't really know what the problem was. Again, that's for them.”

Skubal, making his first home start after coming back from NanoScope elbow surgery, limited the White Sox to Randal Grichuk’s solo home run with one out in the first in terms of runs scored over four innings. In that fifth inning, the White Sox tied the game at 2 as Sam Antonacci, Luisangel Acuña and Miguel Vargas singled, while Grichuk walked.

Junior Perez, who picked up his first career hit in the fourth inning, added his first career homer off Skubal to give the White Sox a 3-2 edge in the sixth. Vasil jumped off the top step to put on the wizard’s hat, and the dugout engaged in an understandably pronounced celebration.

“It was a pretty good chain of events there,” Vasil said. “These guys are the best. They are my teammates and always going to have my back.”

“I wasn't too aware of what was going on,” White Sox right-hander Erick Fedde said. “I just knew there was people yelling. If anything, it just made me want to put up a zero even more that inning. But outside of that, nothing more."

Detroit rallied for two in the sixth off Fedde to claim victory, with Kenley Jansen’s 484th career save punctuating the effort. After the shouting match, with Vasil returning Skubal’s serve from the visitors' dugout, all four umpires met near home plate.

Nothing more came of the situation. Vasil dismissed the idea of Skubal trying to fire up his now 31-44 team with his angry words.

“Was he trying to fire them up? I don’t know if he was trying to fire up their side. Seemed pretty targeted to me. I’m just a guy,” Vasil said. “We started to get on base and like I said, people get paranoid. It was some pretty choice words and then I shared back some choice words. It was good stuff.”

"We're fighting tooth and nail for every win we can get, and obviously we kind of put ourselves in that position,” said Skubal, who struck out eight over 5 2/3 innings. “We've got to fight our way out of it. It's probably a perfect storm for all that stuff to happen and for me to react the way I did."