There's no denying that Paul Skenes is a generational talent. After posting historic numbers in 2024 en route to winning the National League Rookie of the Year Award, the hard-throwing right-hander is putting together an even better 2025 season.
As the end of the regular season draws nearer, Skenes is the overwhelming favorite to win the NL Cy Young Award in his first full season at the big league level. He continues to amaze, and has a chance to make history on Wednesday night in his final start of the 2025 season.
Paul Skenes on the verge of another historical achievement
The Pirates are set to take on the Reds on Wednesday, September 24 at 6:40 p.m. ET in what will be Skenes' final start of the 2025 regular season. Skenes enters his final start with an outstanding 2.03 ERA and 0.96 WHIP through 31 starts on the year. He's racked up 209 strikeouts and issued just 42 walks in 181.2 innings of work, and is holding his opponents to a .199 batting average and lowly .563 OPS.
According to MLB.com, the LSU legend has a chance to become the first qualified pitcher (minimum 1 IP per team game) to end the regular season with an ERA under 2.00 since Justin Verlander in 2022 (1.75). Since 2014, only six qualified pitchers have posted a sub-2.00 ERA: Justin Verlander (1.75) in 2022, Jacob deGrom (1.70) and Blake Snell (1.89) in 2018, Zack Greinke (1.66) and Jake Arrieta (1.77) in 2015, and Clayton Kershaw (1.77) in 2014.
Skenes needs to throw at least three innings without allowing an earned run to get his ERA on the season under 2.00. If he allows a run, he would have to toss at least 7.2 innings to post a sub-2.00 ERA. If he does it, Skenes would be the first Pirates pitcher to accomplish the feat in the live ball era (since 1920). A total of 51 players have done it, but Skenes would become just the fourth pitcher to do it in his age-23 season or younger.
Skenes continues MLB dominance
Skenes has quickly cemented himself as one of the best pitchers in all of baseball. In fact, the argument can be made that he is already the top pitcher in the league after jus 54 career starts. The LSU National Champion has been an All-Star in both of his big league seasons, and his selection in 2024 made him the first No. 1 overall draft pick to make an All-Star team as a rookie. He was just the fifth rookie ever to start the All-Star Game for the National League in 2024, and started the All-Star Game again in 2025.
He won the National League Rookie of the Year Award in 2024 after posting a 1.96 ERA and collecting 170 strikeouts over 23 starts and 133 innings. Despite not making his first MLB start until May 11, he finished third in National League Cy Young voting in his rookie season, and is now primed to win the prestigious award in 2025.
Skenes has thrown just 5.0 and 3.2 innings in each of his last two starts, so perhaps the Pirates are winding down his workload in the final weeks of the season with the team so far away from playoff contention. It seems possible that the Pirates ask Skenes to go just 3-4 innings on Wednesday night, and if he doesn't allow a run, he will accomplish yet another historical feat. The last time he faced the Reds, Skenes tossed seven innings of shutout baseball with eight strikeouts and no walks on August 7.