PITTSBURGH \u2014 Paul Skenes wants the ball. All the time.<\/p>\n
Yet the only pitcher in major league history to start the All-Star Game in each of his first two seasons also understands the Pittsburgh Pirates are intent on playing the long game with his electric right arm.<\/p>\n
They did a year ago, when they put Skenes on a soft innings cap during his remarkable rookie season. They\u2019re doing it again this summer. To a point, anyway.<\/p>\n
So when Skenes walked into the dugout on Monday night after needing 86 pitches to get through six innings against the Detroit Tigers, the 23-year-old didn\u2019t put up a fight when manager Don Kelly turned to reliever Braxton Ashcraft for the seventh in what eventually became a 3-0 victory.<\/p>\n
\u201cI haven\u2019t had a real start in 10 days,\u201d Skenes said after lowering his ERA to 1.91, the best in the majors. \u201cSo it\u2019s a little bit of a ramp back up. I think that it was about as good as it could have been … a pretty good starting point.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sure looked like it. Skenes struck out six while allowing three hits to pick up his first victory since late May. The dry spell had nothing to do with his pitching \u2014 Skenes had a 1.77 ERA in his last eight starts entering Monday. Instead, it can be blamed on an offense that has scored the fewest runs in the majors.<\/p>\n
Skenes has taken the high road amid his team\u2019s struggles, to the point that Kelly needs to remind himself that Skenes just turned 23 less than two months ago.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s wise beyond his years,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cThe maturity level he shows when he\u2019s out there, really, I don\u2019t remember seeing anybody in my time (who\u2019s had that).\u201d<\/p>\n
The Pirates are relying on it as they try to help him navigate his first full season in the big leagues. He bought in \u2014 begrudgingly at first \u2014 to the plan to monitor his workload as a rookie. This year, he wanted to take the ball and let it rip.<\/p>\n
And while he has \u2014 Skenes has thrown 127 innings this season, nearly matching the 133 he tossed after being called up last May \u2014 Pittsburgh is trying to find the safest, healthiest path to help him make to late September.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think anybody has the perfect answer,\u201d Kelly said. \u201cJust trying to make sure that we\u2019re taking everything into account and collaborating with people that know more than even I do about all of this stuff and taking everybody\u2019s thoughts into consideration and finding what we feel is the best way to go.\u201d<\/p>\n
Skenes is a part of that process, and he\u2019s amenable, within reason. He hasn\u2019t thrown more than 88 pitches in any of his four starts this month, even though he\u2019s allowed all of two runs in the process.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s still going to be starts where it\u2019s like, \u2018Hey, go out there and pitch,\u2019\u201d Skenes said. \u201cI think we\u2019re just going to pick our times with that. So I don\u2019t know. There\u2019s a long way to go still. So just going to keep pitching until they take the ball out of my hands.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kelly is hopeful Skenes can flirt with reaching 200 innings, a goal that seems doable if he can make another dozen starts like his first 21 this season. Skenes is a Cy Young Award contender despite playing for a last-place team that will likely be a seller at the trade deadline.<\/p>\n
Pittsburgh\u2019s victory on Monday night was its second in its last 13 games. The energy that characterized Kelly\u2019s first 50 games on the job after replacing Derek Shelton in May has faded in the summer heat.<\/p>\n
All around Skenes on Monday, there were signs of a club already looking to the future \u2014 again. A handful of the team\u2019s picks in last week\u2019s draft stood on the field at PNC Park after signing contracts. Johan Oviedo, who hasn\u2019t pitched in the majors since 2023 while recovering from Tommy John surgery, is hopeful to be back this season, though a return to the rotation might have to wait until 2026.<\/p>\n
The team\u2019s misfortunes, however, have not affected Skenes\u2019 mindset or his performance. He can only control what he can control. Things haven\u2019t gone according to plan \u2014 not by a long shot \u2014 for the Pirates. All the face of the franchise can do is take the ball every handful of days and do his part.<\/p>\n
If that means he won\u2019t get to throw until he thinks he\u2019s done some nights, so be it. He\u2019s willing to go along with whatever the plan is, with one notable exception.<\/p>\n
\u201cNot skipping a start,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s a no-go. That\u2019s not good. … That\u2019s not ideal. We\u2019ve done a good job to this point, just working within our own parameters.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH \u2014 Paul Skenes wants the ball. All the time. Yet the only pitcher in major league history…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30031,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[363,99],"class_list":["post-30030","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}