Paul Skenes is 2-for-2 when it comes to starting the All-Star Game. It was announced on Saturday that Skenes, the Pittsburgh Pirates‘ phenom starting pitcher, is slated to start for the National League in the 2025 All-Star Game on Tuesday night in Atlanta. It will be his second start in as many big league seasons, after he also got the nod in last year’s game as a rookie.
He was informed by National League manager Dave Roberts on Saturday.
Detroit Tigers pitcher Tarik Skubal gets the start for the American League in what will be a gigantic matchup of the game’s best pitchers.
By starting the game again, Skekes also makes some significant baseball history.
He is the first pitcher to ever start the All-Star Game in each of his first two seasons in the Major Leagues, and just the fifth player of all-time. The other four players on the list are Rod Carew, Joe DiMaggio, Frank Robinson and Ichiro Suzuki. All of them are Hall of Famers and among the game’s all-time greatest players. It is a pretty exclusive list to be a part of.
Skenes has been the best pitcher in the National League and one of the few bright spots on an otherwise miserable Pirates team. A lack of run support has produced a dismal 4-8 record for him (while the Pirates have only won nine of his first 20 starts for the season), but that does not even begin to paint the picture of Skenes’ dominance.
He leads the National League (and all of Major League Baseball) with a 2.01 ERA and a 4.8 WAR (Wins Above Replacement), while his 0.93 WHIP (walks/hits per inning pitched) is fifth-best in the league. He is among the league-leaders in pretty much every major starting pitcher category.
His strikeout numbers are down a little from his rookie season, but he is still averaging 9.7 per nine innings and has been far more efficient and regularly pitching deeper into games. At least, he has been until his past few starts when the Pirates have clearly put a strict pitch limit on him, not allowing him to go over 90 pitches in any of his past five starts. Whether that was part of the plan to position him to start the All-Star game, or to limit his innings given how young he is and how important he is to the franchise remains to be seen.
Through his first 43 starts over the first two years of his career, Skenes has a 1.98 ERA and is off to one of the best starts to a career in league history for a starting pitcher. He already has two All-Star Game starts, a Rookie of the Year Award and he might soon add a Cy Young Award to all of that.
Now the Pirates just need to figure out a way to give him some run support and actually build a competitive team around him. So far, they are not even close to that. It does not, and should not, take away from his personal dominance as a starting pitcher.
