Pirates’ Paul Skenes wins 2024 NL Rookie of the Year after dominant debut season

Pittsburgh Pirates starting pitcher Paul Skenes won the 2024 NL Rookie of the Year award, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America announced Monday.

Skenes beat outfielders Jackson Merrill of the San Diego Padres and Jackson Chourio of the Milwaukee Brewers to become the first Pirate to win Rookie of the Year since Jason Bay in 2004 and the first NL starting pitcher to take home the award since Jacob deGrom in 2014.

The right-hander was the No. 1 pick in the 2023 MLB draft, and 10 months later, he found himself making his debut with the Pirates and quickly becoming the team’s ace.

Skenes received 23 of 30 first-place votes and seven second-place votes. Merrill netted seven first-place votes and 23 second-places votes.

The 22-year-old ace’s numbers were so dominant that Skenes was a finalist for the NL Cy Young Award as well.

Skenes’ rookie year ended with him winning 11 of his 23 starts and posting a 1.96 ERA and 0.95 WHIP with 170 strikeouts and 32 walks in 133 innings. He held opponents to a .198 batting average and allowed two or fewer earned runs in 15 of his starts. Skenes is the 11th pitcher in the past 30 seasons to post an ERA under 2.00 while throwing at least 120 innings.

A key factor that played into Skenes’ success in 2024 was his power. He threw 100 pitches at least 100 mph, the most in MLB and well ahead of the 46 thrown by Los Angeles Angels starter José Soriano.

Despite Pittsburgh’s last-place finish in the NL Central for the fourth time in the past six seasons, Skenes provided a glimmer of hope for Pirates fans this year. In July, he became only the fifth rookie pitcher to start an All-Star Game and the first since Hideo Nomo in 1995.

Skenes’ rookie season was so impressive that his own team is going all-out to acquire his autographed MLB Debut rookie card.