(The Center Square) – Fifty-six men risked their lives to sign the Declaration of Independence – not on July 4 but on August 2, 1776.
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There’s the evil empire, and then there are the Dodgers – the merciless mega-team that just made baseball’s nightmare scenario official. On Saturday night, with a day and a half to spare before Monday’s deadline, Los Angeles traded for reigning back-to-back American League Cy Young winner Tarik Skubal from the Detroit Tigers. Take that in. The best pitcher on the planet is now on the best team in baseball. In the days and hours leading up to the blockbuster trade, it started to feel less like a shock and more of an inevitability that Skubal would land in Hollywood. The surprising part was how little it took to acquire two months of Skubal, who is set to become a free agent after this season. Tigers president of baseball operations Scott Harris settled for a meager return that included outfielder Zyhir Hope and right-handers River Ryan and Brady Smith. That package, which has since sparked fury and countless opinions within the industry about the smaller value that Los Angeles gave up, netted Detroit two top-100 prospects without gutting the top of the Dodgers’ farm system. So, what’s the fallout? Let’s dive into what’s next for the Dodgers, and how the trade impacts the starting-pitching market and the rest of the National League now that the deadline’s biggest domino has fallen. What’s Next For The Dodgers? The defending back-to-back champions just got scarier, and they didn’t even have to touch their major league roster to do it. Dodgers president of baseball operations Andrew Friedman leaned on his organizational depth to add the best pitcher in baseball to a rotation that already owned the third-best ERA (3.79) in the NL, and he did it thanks to a strong farm system that rival front offices have envied for years. The Dodgers didn’t need Skubal, but that hardly mattered. If you can go and get the arm that can win you a third consecutive championship, you do it. Now, Skubal slots in as the unquestioned Game 1 starter in October. Following an early-season elbow procedure, he’s back to his usual Cy-Young self, posting a 2.79 ERA with 116 strikeouts in 16 starts and 96 ⅔ innings this season, including a 2.03 ERA in July alone. Skubal joins a ridiculously talented staff that includes reigning World Series MVP Yoshinobu Yamamoto, All-Star Justin Wrobleski, and right-handers Emmet Sheehan and Roki Sasaki. The Dodgers are still confident Shohei Ohtani (left knee soreness) will pitch again this season, while Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow continue working their way back from the injured list. If everyone is healthy for the postseason, Wrobleski, Sheehan, and Sasaki will shift to the bullpen. It’s a mind-numbingly dominant pitching staff that should mentally suppress opposing hitters before they even step into the box. There’s also another layer to this that shouldn’t be overlooked. Part of Friedman’s motivation to land Skubal was presumably to keep the southpaw away from the Brewers and Rays, two smaller-market clubs with the only other top farm systems that could compete with the Dodgers’ offer and pose a more serious threat in the playoffs. His trade for Skubal could also be viewed as an admission that he was starting to get nervous about the competition. Now, Friedman has increased the gap between Los Angeles and everyone else. Skubal gets to experience life on the West Coast and use it as a trial run for a possible long-term future with the Dodgers. In the offseason, he’ll have the opportunity to sign there as a free agent. There’s the evil empire, and then there are the Dodgers. What’s Next For The Starting-Pitching Market? Skubal was always going to set the market, and now that the biggest name is off the board, the rest of the deadline has a clear runway to accelerate. Rival executives had been holding their breath on Skubal for weeks, in part because landing spots for the market’s other arms — Kevin Gausman, Clay Holmes, Casey Mize, George Kirby, Sandy Alcántara, Reid Detmers, Jose Soriano and more — were always going to hinge on which contenders whiffed on Skubal first. The group of starting pitchers who are available and could be on the move is unusually deep this summer, and now it’s about to get picked apart in a hurry. The next domino was Mets right-hander Freddy Peralta, who was traded to the Tampa Bay Rays in the early afternoon on Sunday. Miami has held firm on Alcántara for most of the summer, but with Monday’s 6 p.m. ET deadline bearing down, that stance will be tested by every team that missed on Skubal and still needs an upgrade. Toronto’s Gausman, a veteran rental on a last-place club, is squarely in the mix for teams like the Phillies, Cubs, Braves, Brewers and Rays. Now, though, you have to wonder if the price for all these pitchers has changed after what Skubal went for. Almost everyone in the industry is shocked the Dodgers didn’t have to give up one or more of their top three prospects for their new ace. Peralta netted the Mets three Rays prospects, ranked Nos. 15, 26 and 27 in Tampa Bay’s system, according to MLB Pipeline. Peralta has struggled this season with a 4.99 ERA and 1.48 WHIP in 22 starts, but his track record indicates he’s capable of better results. Still, with the deadline’s headliner gone, expect the next 24 hours to bring a flurry of moves as several contenders — all of whom now know they’re chasing a fortified defending champion — scramble to find their next-best option before the board clears out. What’s Next For The Rest Of The National League? If you’re the Braves, Phillies, Cubs or Brewers, Saturday night just moved the goalposts regarding what winning in October will require. The Dodgers were already the team to beat. Now they’ve added the pitcher with the third-highest strikeout rate in baseball to a roster that already looked primed for a three-peat. Every other NL contender just got a very public reminder of how far behind they’re playing. Milwaukee, sitting on one of the best farm systems in the sport, was viewed as one of the few threats with enough ammunition to actually pry Skubal away. Instead, the Brewers watched the Dodgers get him without touching a single big leaguer. That had to sting. That had to be a gut check for a Milwaukee front office that had been patiently building for this kind of moment. Atlanta and Philadelphia, both connected to Skubal in recent weeks, now have to decide whether to go hard for Gausman or another rotation arm just to keep pace. Or they can stand pat because they’ll run into the buzz saw that is the Dodgers, anyway. How deflating is that? There’s a psychological cost to all of this that shouldn’t be understated. Every contender in the NL now has to build its deadline plan around the assumption that if it meets the Dodgers in October, it’s facing peak Ohtani (whenever his knee cooperates), Yamamoto and now Skubal in a playoff series. Especially with MLB’s Collective Bargaining Agreement expiring and a lockout looming, it might push rivals to get aggressive before the deadline. Either that, or contenders can face the uncomfortable truth and accept that 2026 was always going to run through Los Angeles anyway.Latest Sports News from FOX Sports
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The fight over data centers has suddenly become a defining battle in the race to run Kansas — on both sides of the aisle.
Gubernatorial hopefuls are trying to leverage the issue to weaken their rivals in the final stretch before Tuesday’s primaries, with attack ads, dark money and accusations of flip-flopping roiling the race. Democratic state Sen. Cindy Holscher and GOP state Sen. Ty Masterson, two of the top contenders in their respective fields, are bearing the brunt of the criticism.
Republican businessman Philip Sarnecki has spent more than $300,000 on ads attacking Masterson for voting for a bill last year to expand data center construction and give 20-year tax breaks to developers, accusing him of being beholden to big tech.
On the Democratic side, Holscher voted for the same bill but has now staked out a populist stance calling for a moratorium on data centers — an appeal to the same grassroots base that has put her in a strong position to win. Her primary opponents are attacking her as a flip-flopper, and social media ads fueled by anonymous backers keep highlighting her past vote in support of data centers. She’s up against state Sen. Ethan Corson, whom Gov. Laura Kelly endorsed, and Overland Park Mayor Kurt Skoog.
The brawl shows just how divisive and complicated the politics of data centers has become, as politicians in both parties struggle to define a clear winning position on the mass hubs amid growing voter backlash. A July POLITICO Poll found that Americans are increasingly souring on data centers, a trend that’s especially evident among Democrats but crosses partisan lines.
Republican and Democratic candidates are harnessing that opposition to gain an edge in crowded primaries, a rare moment of partisan crossover that speaks to its potency.
In Kansas, a state with nearly 40 data centers and many pending proposals, local opposition to the industry has animated city council meetings from Wichita to Kansas City. Several towns, like Topeka, have chosen to pass one-year moratoriums to give leaders more time to study the proposals.
Now, the state’s top race is getting caught in the crossfire, as Democrats look for a way to hold onto the governor’s mansion after eight years under Kelly — and Republicans grow bullish about taking back the seat in a red state that voted for President Donald Trump by 16 points in 2024.
“It’s bleeding across both primaries and it’s blurring traditional party stances,” said Bob Beatty, a political science professor at Washburn University in Topeka, who said the rapidly shifting politics speak to a growing “fear around AI.”
Tuesday’s Kansas primaries will help show the party bases’ appetite for data centers — signaling whether voters are looking for a leader who takes a strong position against new developments or a middle-of-the-road approach aimed at bringing in more tax revenue.
Both Masterson’s and Holscher’s campaigns are dismissive that the attack ads will work.
“It’s a very kind of kitchen sink approach here at the end,” said a Masterson campaign adviser, granted anonymity to speak freely about the race. The aide argued that the attacks have been ineffective against the state Senate president, especially given he’s the Trump-endorsed candidate in a state the president won three times.
Holscher, who said in an interview she regrets her vote, argued her new position reflects where people across the state stand now: “This is a unifying issue in terms of where people are on it, urban and rural as well as young and old,” she said in an interview. “I’m the only Democrat in this race to call for a moratorium on data centers because we have to get these guardrails in place. We are having our people and our resources exploited.”
Data center construction — and hostility towards them — exploded after passage of the 2025 legislation backed by Holscher and Masterson, which saw widestrong bipartisan support and was signed by Kelly, a pro-business Democrat.
Masterson has said that “folks build here on our terms, or they don’t build here,” and that local communities should be in charge of deciding whether they want the infrastructure. He supports a Kansas version of the White House’s position on data centers — a voluntary commitment designed to prevent them from driving up utility bills.
But several of his Republican opponents take a more hardline approach by calling for an outright moratorium, like Sarnecki and Insurance Commissioner Vicki Schmidt, another candidate in the top tier of the field.
The Kansas Comeback PAC, linked to Sarnecki, has challenged Masterson’s vote for the 2025 bill. “After 20 years in politics, Ty Masterson has mastered the game,” the TV ad by Kansas Comeback PAC says. “Thousands from big tech. Rewarded them with tax breaks.”
On the Democratic side, it’s difficult to tell who’s leading the field given limited public polling. Holscher’s supporters have cast the race as a choice between a populist fighter and a safe establishment figure, and they believe she will be boosted by the national tailwinds propelling leftwing candidates in states like Colorado, New York and Michigan. One survey from June, conducted before the candidates began running ads, had Holscher up by 27 points.
Corson is also backed by former Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and Lt. Gov. David Toland, and supporters believe he has the necessary crossparty appeal to win the general election in conservative Kansas. Kelly cut a TV ad on his behalf that started to run in major media markets last week.
While Holscher now wants to pause construction to give time to develop regulations, Corson supports construction moving forward with data center development, with guardrails around energy costs and water usage.
“Cindy seems to think that we should just go along with her flip-flopping and not making up her mind and doing what’s politically convenient for her race, and that’s not what we’re going to do.” said Ty Dragoo, chair of the Working Kansas Alliance, a group of more than 23 unions. Corson has raked in endorsements from trades unions like those represented by Dragoo’s group.
“Our north star is to get jobs, to get high-paying jobs, and to get sustaining jobs, and we’re not going to deviate from that.”
Holscher says her experience holding town halls throughout the state, including in deep red areas, opened her eyes to the depth of the opposition to the developments, which have sparked concerns about human health and environmental harms like water usage.
“She’s been listening, and people just want to be heard,” said Democratic state Rep. Linda Featherston, a Holscher supporter. “You have to be out amongst the people listening to what they have to say and not just brushing them off.”
But Holscher’s push for a moratorium has alienated some county, state and labor leaders who see an opportunity for data centers to boost the state’s economy. Corson is advocating for a local-first approach where communities get to decide whether they want to welcome the industry, while at the same time instituting statewide regulations so that the facilities pay energy costs, minimize water usage and ease the tax burden on residents nearby.
“Ultimately, these decisions should be made by communities, not by politicians in Topeka,” Corson said in a statement. “I believe some communities will look at a potential project and decide to move forward, and when they do, my Department of Commerce will work side-by-side with them to make it as beneficial for the community as possible. But other communities will decide that a data center is not a good fit, and as governor, I will absolutely respect that decision.”
Corson’s war chest also puts him in a good position to face off against likely opponent Masterson, who will bring the force of the national GOP’s deep pockets. The Republican Governors Association has already placed a nearly $7 million TV ad reservation in major Kansas media markets starting immediately after the primary.
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