All-Star starter Paul Skenes is off to one of the best career starts ever

On July 9, 2023, the Pittsburgh Pirates made LSU right-hander Paul Skenes the top pick in the 2023 MLB Draft. Skenes was widely regarded as one of the best pitching prospects the game has ever seen, and he has already embarked on a rapid and meteoric rise from one of the sport's best prospects to one of the sport's best players.

It took Skenes just 308 days after being drafted to make his MLB debut. He was electrifying and every bit as advertised in his debut, which, to this point, was the shortest and worst of his 11 big league starts. His numbers are already incredible - 66.1 innings pitched, 89 strikeouts, just 13 walks, and a miniscule 1.90 ERA while averaging six innings per start.

This led to Skenes being named to the NL All-Star team, making him the first player ever to be the top draft choice one year and an MLB All-Star the next season. As if that wasn't enough, he was ultimately named the National League's starting pitcher for the contest. He joins Hideo Nomo, Fernando Valenzuela, Mark Fidrych, and Dave Stenhouse as the only rookies to start the All-Star Game. They had done so after 13, 24, 13, and 22 career games, respectively - again, Skenes has appeared in just 11 MLB games. It took Skenes just 374 days after being drafted to reach those heights.

Paul Skenes obviously has accomplished a ton in a short amount of time. But what specifically has that looked like, and how does he stack up against other young pitching phenoms?

Skenes became such a highly touted prospect thanks to his 80-grade fastball, one that routinely hits triple-digits, as well as a 70-grade slider. His fastball averages 99.1 MPH and has been clocked as high as 102. Opponents are batting just .239 (with an expected batting average of .198) against the pitch and whiff on over 30 percent of swings.

The slider has been even better. Skenes has ended 37 plate appearances with a slider, resulting in just five hits (although an unsustainable three home runs), no walks, and 16 strikeouts. The pitch sports an xwOBA (which uses expected stats instead of raw results to measure offensive production and is scaled to on-base percentage) of .156, which is a ridiculous number, and 100 points lower than any of his other pitches.

But what has set Skenes apart and accelerated his development is his implementation of the splinker, a pitch he hadn't even begun toying with until after he was drafted. The pitch features slightly above-average movement (both horizontally and vertically) compared to a league-average splitter, but at a much higher velocity. The average MLB splitter is thrown at 86.5 MPH; Skenes' averages 94.1 MPH.

Skenes has thrown his splinker almost twice as often as his slider, and with good reason - it produces whiffs at a rate on par with his electric fastball, and hitters are batting just .157 and slugging .193 against it. It has also become his go-to pitch when he needs a groundball - it has induced grounders at an absurd 69.4 percent rate. The pitch has a Run Value of 13, making it the sixth-most valuable pitch in MLB despite Skenes not even making his debut until the second week of May.

All of this has culminated in Skenes becoming one of Major League Baseball's best pitchers since his debut (he's tied for fourth in fWAR and second in ERA and strikeout rate since he was called up on May 11). He is more than holding his own against the best of the best. When looking at other pitchers over the past few decades who were considered elite, generational talents coming out of the draft and through the minor leagues, he compares favorably to them as well.

Stephen Strasburg, Gerrit Cole, and Mark Prior are often mentioned when discussing the best pitching prospects in recent memory. Josh Beckett is widely considered the best prep pitcher ever drafted, and Kerry Wood, also a very high draft pick, took MLB by storm when he debuted in a manner similar to that of Skenes. Here is how each of their numbers looked through 11 career MLB starts:

A few things stand out here. One is that, despite the new age of pitching management and how cautious the Pirates were with handling Skenes at the beginning of the year, he's still right there with all those other guys in terms of innings. He only went four-plus innings on 84 pitches in his debut, but has achieved at least five innings pitched and 93 pitches thrown in every start since, including reaching the 100-pitch plateau four times.

It cannot be ignored that Skenes' numbers across the board are pretty clearly the best of that group. His run and runner prevention are tops by a landslide (this isn't exactly an apples-to-apples comparison; Wood's impressive run came during the peak of the Steroid Era), and his ability to miss bats is right up there with Strasburg and Wood while also exhibiting pristine control (his walk rate is currently in the 90th percentile of all qualified pitchers).

But most importantly, with Skenes in the fold, the Pirates have been winners. The Bucs are 8-3 when Skenes pitches and 31-26 since he debuted. They went into the All-Star break as MLB's hottest team, winning each of their last four games, which also got the team back to .500 for the first time since late April. Hopefully the front office is inclined to add a bat or two, allowing the Pirates to play meaningful baseball deep into September and allowing Skenes to continue to be a national story.

Pirates' Paul Skenes is off to one of the greatest starts to a career that we've ever seen.

Lofty expectations were placed upon Skenes after his dominant college career and subsequent selection as a No. 1 overall pick. Still, he arrived in Pittsburgh quicker than many anticipated and immediately began dominating the highest level of competition. All eyes will be on the Pirates' rookie during the first inning of Tuesday's All-Star Game and throughout the rest of the season as the Bucs, hopefully, make a push for October.