Pittsburgh Pirates’ pitcher Paul Skenes has been selected by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America as the 2025 National League Cy Young Award winner. Skenes’ unanimous selection, which was announced live on MLB Network on Nov. 12, saw him collect 30 first-place votes.
Although Philadelphia Phillies’ Cristopher Sanchez and Los Angeles Dodgers’ Yoshinobu Yamamoto were among the three finalists for the award recognizing the top pitcher in the league for this past season, it was a foregone conclusion for many baseball insiders that Skenes had the award won as the regular season wrapped up in September.
Skenes, the 2024 National League Rookie of the Year, performed as dominant an individual season pitching in 2025 as any hurler has in the game’s modern era. He is now the third player in MLB history, joining Fernando Valenzuela and Dwight Gooden, to have won the Rookie of the Year and Cy Young Awards within their first two seasons.
Skenes went 10–10 in 2025, and in more than 187 innings only surrendered 41 earned runs, while walking just 42 baserunners. The 1.97 ERA registered by Skenes is the lowest measured by any MLB pitcher this past season.
Along with Skenes’ pitching dominance, his starts in the pitching rotation is an economic boon for the Pirates at PNC Park. Pittsburgh, 26th in attendance of all 30 MLB clubs in 2025 at 18,827 per home game, sees huge jumps in fan interest when Skenes is on the mound.
Last April 19, when the Cleveland Guardians came to Pittsburgh, a Skenes bobblehead giveaway promotion attracted 37,713. The fans’ demand for the freebie far exceeded the 20,000 bobbleheads ordered. The line for those attending the game hoping to secure the Skenes’ keepsake, hours before the gates at PNC Park were scheduled to open, snaked along the Roberto Clemente Bridge and through the city’s North Shore. Those who had their e-tickets scanned and didn’t receive a bobblehead on the day that the Guardians were in town received one at a later date.
The Pirates-Guardians game featuring the Skenes bobblehead is the second-largest home crowd for the Pirates last season.
Doug Drabek, who pitched five of his 13 MLB seasons for the Pirates and won the National League Cy Young Award in 1990 while with Pittsburgh, made the announcement of Skenes winning his first Cy Young Award remotely from his home in Texas.
“Winning [the Cy Young Award] is pretty special. Every baseball fan knows it,” Skenes said during a teleconference with reporters after the award announcement was made. “I’m so grateful to have won it. We play this game because we love it.”
Skenes said he ranks being healthy throughout his first full MLB season as the “sweetest” part of his successful 2025 in Pittsburgh. As much as pitching’s highest individual honor is for Skenes, he doesn’t hesitate to state that he would trade the Cy Young Award in a heartbeat for his team’s success in the postseason.
“I want the [Pirates] team to experience the success that I am tonight,” says Skenes, who is now the third Pittsburgh pitcher to have captured the Cy Young Award. “I began my off-season program two weeks and two days ago. I wish it was reporting day for spring training now.”
With an enormous amount of media conversation during the 2025 season regarding Skenes in contention for the Cy Young Award, according to the Pirates’ ace, he didn’t give much thought to winning it or not. He said focusing on winning ballgames and hoping for the Pirates to finish with a better overall record from the previous season is what kept his attention. Not until after the Pirates’ season finale in Atlanta did Skenes allow the award to become something that he discussed.
Other past pressures, such as contending for and winning the Rookie of the Year Award, pitching in the College World Series, and being the overall No. 1 MLB Draft pick in 2023 by Pittsburgh has prepared Skenes well for what promises to be a long and celebrated career.
Giving up less runs and striking out more batters next season remains front and center for Skenes’ approach in 2026. With the Pirates finishing at the bottom of the National League Central the past two seasons, Skenes hears the rumors that he is supposedly positioning himself to move on to a contending team. However, a strong 2026 season for Skenes translates into winning constantly in Pittsburgh.
“There are 29 fan bases in baseball that expect us to lose,” Skenes said. “I want to be part of the team that changes that.”
Armed with seven different pitches to keep batters guessing and a burning desire to lead the Pirates back to a World Series appearance, something the organization hasn’t experienced since 1979, is what has transformed Skenes into the ultimate team player. Beyond all the favorable statistics that on paper define who the pitcher is, he is a person that genuinely cares about his adopted professional city—how wonderfully unique in today’s business environment of professional sports.
Hall of Famer Cy Young, who the MLB pitching award is named for, pitched 22 years professionally and won 511 games. He is the game’s all-time winningest pitcher.
