After hometown World Series run, Jack Flaherty is heading back to Detroit

At the start of the offseason, Los Angeles native and Dodgers World Series champion Jack Flaherty voiced his desire to remain with his hometown team.

But it became clear long ago this winter that the Dodgers — who have replenished their rotation with marquee signings of Blake Snell and Roki Sasaki — wouldn’t have the room to bring him back.

So, Flaherty decided to return to his other 2024 club instead.

On Sunday night, Flaherty and the Detroit Tigers, the team that sent Flaherty to the Dodgers at the trade deadline last season, agreed to a two-year contract for $35 million, ESPN reported. Flaherty, who posted a picture to X of himself in a Tigers uniform after the news broke, will make $25 million in 2025 and have a $10-million player option in 2026 — creating the possibility he will be back on the free-agent market again next winter.

It was a little over a year ago that Flaherty first signed with Detroit, joining the Tigers last offseason on a one-year deal.

Once a budding ace with the St. Louis Cardinals, Flaherty was looking to rebuild his stock after injury troubles and inconsistent performance. And in Detroit, the right-hander staged the turnaround he was hoping for.

In the first half of the season, Flaherty posted a 7-5 record and 2.95 ERA in 18 starts. With the Tigers then on the fringes of the playoff picture (they would later rally down the stretch to earn a wild-card berth), Flaherty became one of the top starters available on the midseason trade market.

On deadline day, the New York Yankees nixed a potential deal for Flaherty because of reported concerns over his medical records. That opened the door for the Dodgers, who were in desperate need of pitching help after a wave of injuries ravaged their rotation, to swoop in at the last second and add the Harvard-Westlake product to their undermanned staff.

Just as they hoped, Flaherty became a stabilizing force for the Dodgers on the mound. He went 6-2 with a 3.58 ERA in 10 starts down the stretch. And by the playoffs, he was one of only three healthy starters remaining on the roster, leading the team in innings pitched during their extended October campaign.

Flaherty’s postseason performance was inconsistent. He twice led the club to key wins in Game 1 of both the National League Championship Series and World Series. But he also suffered several clunkers, including an eight-run outing in Game 5 of the NLCS and an abbreviated four-run start in Game 5 of the World Series.

The Dodgers, of course, overcame Flaherty’s struggles in the latter contest, rallying from the early hole to clinch the title at Yankee Stadium. And as Flaherty celebrated the championship, he held out hope of remaining with his favorite childhood team.

“I love this city,” Flaherty said during the team’s World Series parade. “I never want to leave. I never want to leave.”

Despite that, Flaherty never seemed likely to stay with the Dodgers this winter.

The expectation was that he would cash in on his strong 2024 season to land a longer-term deal elsewhere. The Dodgers, meanwhile, added Snell (a two-time Cy Young Award winner) and Sasaki (a 23-year-old phenom from Japan) to a rotation that will also get Shohei Ohtani, Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May back from injuries next season.

“I’m not going back to L.A. most likely — I can do the numbers, do the math,” Flaherty told Foul Territory last month. “It doesn’t bother me. I’m trying to go elsewhere and win and see if we can’t beat those guys.”

Flaherty didn’t ultimately get the long-term deal he was looking for (though he will earn a substantial 2025 salary and is positioned to test the free-agent waters again next season). However, he will get to return to a familiar setting in Detroit, rejoining a Tigers team he spoke highly of after his trade to the Dodgers.

“I really enjoyed my time with Detroit,” Flaherty said during the NLCS. “What those guys were able to do in the second half and the run that they made, I think, surprised a lot of people. I don’t think it really surprised me.”