Subscribe
Follow Us
The Pittsburgh Pirates have a great one in the making in the form of star pitcher Paul Skenes. The former LSU Tiger star did not waste much time showing his excellent stuff in the big leagues.
In just his first season in the MLB, Skenes turned heads with his performance on the mound, finishing the 2024 MLB campaign with an 11-3 record and a 1.96 ERA through 23 appearances (all starts) and 133.0 innings. He also finished third in the National League Cy Young Award voting with a voting share of 25 percent — just behind award winner Chris Sale of the Atlanta Braves and Zack Wheeler of the Philadelphia Phillies.
That's just the start for Skenes, who also earned an All-Star nod and won the National League Rookie of the Year award in 2024.
Skenes has dreams of winning a Cy Young Award, and based on his rookie-season performance, that's a goal he could achieve multiple times. He wants to become a perennial Cy Young Award contender and he aspires to become a unanimous winner of that honor.
Paul Skenes also mentioned Detroit Tigers star pitcher Tarik Skubal, who just unanimously won the American League Cy Young Award in 2024. Skubal got 100 percent of the vote shares to claim the honor.
“I mean you saw what Tarik [Skubal] did with the unanimous Cy Young Award,” Skenes said in a recent appearance on the “Foul Territory” podcast.
Skubal went 18-4 with a 2.39 ERA and 170 ERA+ through 31 starts for the Tigers in 2024, making himself a clear choice by voters to win the AL Cy Young over the likes of Seth Lugo of the Kansas City Royals and Emmanuel Clase of the Cleveland Guardians.
“I think that's probably the coolest honor in terms of getting an award like this is a unanimous [Baseball] Hall of Fame selection too like having everybody kind of agree that you know, you're the guy a little bit. So, hopefully, that's the goal that's one of the things that's pushed me a little bit this offseason. So, something to work for and look forward to next year,” Skenes added.
Despite Skenes' brilliance on the mound in 2024, the Pirates missed another boat ride to the MLB playoffs, as they finished last in the NL Central division with a 76-86 record.
