Reigning National League Cy Young winner hasn’t quite been himself on the mound in 2026, and it’s costing his team, the , as they angle to make the playoffs for the first time in more than a decade.
That’s been especially the case of late. On Wednesday, Skenes allowed three runs in five innings in an eventual loss to the while walking four batters over that span. In his two starts before that, Skenes allowed 13 runs in 14 ⅓ innings with a combined 10 walks. Needless to say, such a lack of control is uncharacteristic for Skenes, and it’s played a central role in his relative struggles this season.
“You can’t walk guys,” Skenes said after his Wednesday start, via . “Probably tried to be a little too perfect at times, then you put yourself in those positions, kind of open yourself up to a hit. It’s just not where you need to be, not where you want to be.”
The phrase “relative struggles” is key because Skenes this season hasn’t been bad in a vacuum. He’s pitched to a 3.96 ERA, which comes to a 109 ERA+ – or a park-adjusted ERA that’s 9% better than the league average. As well, Skenes’ 4.50 K/BB ratio ranks fourth among NL qualifiers. Probe a bit more deeply, and you’ll find he has an FIP — or an expected ERA that removes the effects of defense and luck — of 2.86. So, yes, Skenes has indeed been unlucky this season, as suggested by his somewhat elevated BABIP of .309.
However, it’s not simply a matter of misfortune. Skenes this season has shed some velocity on both his fastball and his sinker, and, , the traits of Skenes’ fastball, sinker, slider, and changeup have gotten significantly worse. As for the control issues, overall, they’re not quite as severe as they’ve been in his most recent starts. Skenes’ walks as a percentage of batters faced have ticked up from 5.7% in 2025 to 6.8% this season. Skenes has worked in the zone less often than he has in past seasons, and that hasn’t been fully offset by an uptick in his chase rate.
Mechanically, he’s a bit different, as this season his arm slot has crept up three degrees, and his landing spot is slightly deeper on all his pitches. Those minor factors, though, may have nothing to do with what’s afflicting Skenes right now. Assuming he’s not pitching through fatigue or discomfort, this could just be one of those baseball things in which the long season being so animated by randomness can, on occasion, have its way with even the strongest known quantities of the sport.
For the Pirates, though, this is ill-timed. Skenes over the first two seasons and 55 starts of his big-league career had an ERA of 1.96 (!). The Pirates, though, didn’t otherwise behave seriously and surround Skenes with a supporting cast capable of relevance, even in this era of playoff bloat.
Coming into 2026, though, the Pirates did invest in the roster, at least by the subterranean standards of owner Bob Nutting. They even behaved like buyers at the deadline, as lead decision-maker Ben Cherington heavily remade the bullpen for the stretch drive. Going into Thursday’s series finale in Milwaukee, the Pirates are 57-59, which puts them 4 ½ games out of the third and final wild card spot in the NL and behind four teams in that chase. Add it all up, and gives them a 31% chance of making the playoffs. That’s significant, even if it suggests mathematical improbability.
The Pirates are a bit like Skenes writ large this season in that poor fortune has played a role. Pittsburgh has a run differential of plus-27, the fifth-best mark in the NL. Such a run differential should give them a record of 61-55, which would put them a mere half-game out of wild card position (behind the and their negative run differential). That’s not the reality, though, and because the Pirates have gotten broadly unlucky in situations that can undermine a team’s run differential, they’re working from behind.
A vintage 2024-25 Skenes could have cleared all that right up to a large extent, but that’s not what they’ve gotten so far. This isn’t to level the blame at Skenes alone, but the Pirates’ belated decision to build around their ace and Skenes’ untimely relative struggles — that phrase again — have complicated the team’s contending ambitions.
The good news for the Pirates is that Skenes, provided his recent dip doesn’t persist, should be better than he has been on the run-prevention front, even if the underlying levels don’t quite portend a return to Cy Young form right away.
The bad news is that it’s getting late out there and the Pirates are working from behind.
