Paul Skenes entered the All-Star break seemingly on top of the baseball world, earning the starting pitcher designation for the NL and surging to Cy Young contention despite spending the first six weeks of the season in the minors.
Skenes hasn’t necessarily fallen from grace. In fact, his numbers remain some of the best of any pitcher since his debut. But the Cy Young and even Rookie of the Year dreams are beginning to look less certain than previously believed.
As the Pirates slide further out of contention, the Cy Young and Rookie of the Year spotlights have started to focus on players still very much participating in the postseason chase. Could that make the difference and keep Skenes from receiving any hardware?
Here’s a look at Skenes’ major award odds as the final stretch of the regular season approaches.
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Paul Skenes NL Rookie of the Year odds
Skenes remains a slight favorite for NL Rookie of the Year with -145 odds, according to BetMGM. Padres outfielder Jackson Merrill is a close second at -110, with no other contender under +4000.
It’s a two-man race at this point, which is good news for Skenes. As long as he finishes top-two in Rookie of the Year voting, the No. 1 pick will accrue a full year of service time and move on track to become a free agent after the 2029 season. If Skenes finishes outside the top two, he will remain under team control through 2030 because he didn’t debut until early May.
It’s becoming clear Skenes is at real risk of missing out on the award, however. He hasn’t had any truly damaging starts, but he hasn’t been the same dominant pitcher in recent weeks as he was in his first two months in the majors. Skenes’ velocity has also dipped as his workload increases — he’s thrown 125.1 innings between the majors and minors this season.
There exists the possibility the Pirates will take note of both the velocity decline and their own fading postseason chances and shut Skenes down at some point in September. That scenario is likely contributing to Merrill’s surging odds.
More than anything, though, the Padres rookie has cut into Skenes’ lead because he’s been excellent since the All-Star break. The 21-year-old has a .327 AVG and .995 OPS since his first All-Star appearance, and more than half of his hits since that point are extra-base hits.
In the meantime, the Padres have been virtually unstoppable over the past month and hold the NL’s top wild card spot. Team success doesn’t have to correlate to individual awards, but Merrill has produced a few clutch hits that have stolen the attention away from Skenes.
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Paul Skenes NL Cy Young odds
Skenes still has the third-shortest NL Cy Young odds, according to BetMGM, but there is distance between him and the two frontrunners.
At +1800, Skenes is well behind Atlanta’s Chris Sale (-350) and Philadelphia’s Zack Wheeler (+280).
Skenes’ path to the Cy Young Award was always an uphill battle because of the innings gap that naturally comes with spending the first six weeks of the season in the minors, but he was so dominant leading up to the All-Star break that he forced himself into the conversation.
One possible reason for Skenes’ Cy Young surge was uncertainty about whether Sale, who has a lengthy injury history, would hold up down the stretch. So far, he has. The Braves ace has a 2.35 ERA and 47 strikeouts in five starts since the break, solidifying himself as the clear frontrunner for the award.
Sale has tossed 42 more innings than Skenes, and it’s becoming clear that Skenes won’t be able to make up that gap against him or Wheeler even if he isn’t shut down.
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Paul Skenes vs. Jackson Merrill stats
The numbers battle between Skenes and Merrill isn’t a one-to-one comparison, as they play two very different roles, but one look at Merrill’s stats indicate why he’s right there with the Pirates phenom in the Rookie of the Year race.
Paul Skenes
| Starts | IP | ERA | WHIP | K | BB | K/9 | bWAR | fWAR |
| 16 | 98.0 | 2.30 | 0.97 | 121 | 24 | 11.1 | 4.0 | 2.6 |
Jackson Merrill
| Games | AVG | HR | RBI | OPS | OPS+ | bWAR | fWAR |
| 122 | .289 | 17 | 69 | .804 | 124 | 3.4 | 3.7 |
Skenes has the bWAR advantage while Merrill has the clear fWAR advantage. While Merrill’s on-base ability has kept his OPS lower than one would expect, his strong centerfield defense is another factor that keeps his overall value sky-high.
If either Skenes or Merrill were playing for an AL team, they would likely be a runaway Rookie of the Year winner. The NL is where the competition is the stiffest this year, however, and both have a serious chance at the award at this point.
