The Pittsburgh ace pitcher is off to a historic start thanks to his elite pitch variety. Will the Pirates be able to take advantage?
It’s not hyperbole to say that we have not seen a Major League Baseball pitcher like Paul Skenes in the last 100 years.
The Pittsburgh Pirates‘ 23-year-old superstar starting pitcher has a sterling 1.88 ERA in an MLB-leading 91 innings pitched this season. Skenes, the 2024 National League Rookie of the Year, has a 1.93 ERA over the first 37 starts of his MLB career, the second-lowest mark of any pitcher since 1913. According to Baseball-Reference, he leads all pitchers in Wins Above Replacement and is on pace to be under serious consideration for his first career Cy Young Award after finishing third as a rookie. Skenes was one of five players in MLB history to finish in the top three in Cy Young voting as a rookie, and the first to do it since the late José Fernández in 2013.
Skenes also leads MLB this season in base-out runs saved while currently in the top 10 in every other major statistical category besides wins (more on that in a bit). So what makes the flame-throwing righty so historically dominant?
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Per MLB.com, “Expected Weighted On-base Average (xwOBA) is formulated using exit velocity, launch angle and, on certain types of batted balls, sprint speed.” Essentially, it measures the expected offensive production and the likelihood of a player making it on base based on the quality of contact a hitter makes.
On Skenes’ four-seam fastball that averages 98.1 miles per hour, accounting for 35% of his pitches thrown, his .280 xwOBA ranks seventh among all MLB pitchers who have thrown at least 300 of those pitches this season. His 93.6 mph split-finger fastball, which is thrown 21.7% of the time, yields a .321 xwOBA, the pitch hitters have been most successful against in 2025. It still ranks 16th among all pitchers who’ve hurled at least 200 splitters this season. While Skenes only throws his sinker 8.4% of the time, his .249 xwOBA ranks eighth among all pitchers with 100 of them thrown, impressive considering that number also includes relief pitchers like Aroldis Chapman, who make their careers specializing in those offerings.
And while opposing hitters are concentrating on catching up to Skenes’ fastballs, it’s his off-speed pitches that make him elite. Skenes’ 84.4 mph sweeper, a new-age hybrid between a slider and a curveball that he throws 15.6% of the time, leads all of baseball among pitchers with at least 100 sweepers thrown with a .183 xwOBA. His 88.1 mph changeup, accounting for 8.2% of his pitches, leads MLB with at least 100 changeups thrown with an absurd .100 xWOBA. And while he’s only thrown 91 sliders so far this season, Skenes’ .160 xwOBA on those pitches ranks fifth among all pitchers with at least 50 sliders.
To quickly summarize, Skenes throws six different types of pitches, accounting for 95.5% of his 2025 total. Five of those pitches rank in the top 10 in MLB in terms of his opponents’ ability to make contact and reach base. Two of them are the very best pitches in the game. It’s no wonder, then, that of his 37 career starts, he’s allowed three runs or more in only five of those contests.
Yet despite the brilliance Skenes has displayed throughout his young career, Pittsburgh is only 21-16 in games he’s pitched in, including 6-8 this season. In 14 starts in 2025, the Pirates have scored four or more runs in a Skenes game just three times. The Bucs are 29th out of 30 MLB teams in total runs scored and are 27th in OPS, poorly taking advantage of Skenes’ all-time great start on the mound.
While there have been think pieces wondering whether Pittsburgh should trade Skenes for an armada of prospects who could be good when the team is better equipped to compete, that makes as much sense as the Pirates giving me $50 million to play second base. Skenes is making just $875,000 in 2025 as a second-year player and has one more season at a six-figure salary before his three years of arbitration. Dollar for dollar, there’s no more valuable pitcher in baseball right now.
At 27-41, Pittsburgh has a current payroll of just over $90 million, fifth-lowest in MLB. They have a generational pitcher on a rookie-scale contract that they should be devoting more resources to building around. While it’s probably incredibly frustrating as a Pirates fan, if you love baseball or are even curious about the sport, turn on a Bucs game and go watch Skenes dominate in ways we haven’t seen in any of our lifetimes.
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