Dodgers go all in, Yankees come up short as MLB trade deadline passes
Bob Nightengale breaks down why the Dodgers won the MLB trade deadline after landing Tarik Skubal, plus other winners and losers.
Sports Pulse
Paul Skenes opened July by allowing seven earned runs in four innings at Philadelphia, the worst start of his career. It was the appropriate opening to a month where he posted a 6.25 ERA over six starts. Wednesday night, he made his first start in August and of what the Pirates have to hope is the beginning of a turnaround.
Wednesday night Skenes allowed three runs on two hits and four walks. He struck out six over five innings, throwing 93 pitches. It was the most encouraging thing that happened to him in five weeks, and it still is not good enough. He left the game trailing.
The month-by-month on Skenes is grim.
His ERA in April was 1.89. Then 2.87 in May, 4.23 in June and then the ugly 6.25 in July when he allowed 22 earned runs in six starts.
He is still striking people out. He punched out 42 hitters in July, but the walks have ballooned. He walked 12 in July and with four on Wednesday, he’s a third of the way there for August.
Velocity has been the issue everyone is pointing to. His fastball has lost over a tick, averaging 97 this season, down from 98.2 last year and 98.8 as a rookie. He has not thrown a single pitch at 100 this season after throwing 100 of them last year.
Still, his fastball is working.
Hitters are batting .188 against the four-seamer, the best mark of Skenes’ career. It’s the rest of his arsenal that is failing him. Skenes’ off-speed pitches rank 17th this season, after ranking in the 98th percentile last season. Fangraphs found hitters are on time against him on 45% of their swings, up from 39% last year, and they are squaring the ball up on nearly half of them after doing it 30% of the time in 2025.
The Pirates’ defense has been no help.
Pittsburgh is minus-12 in outs above average and sixth-worst in baseball at turning batted balls into outs. Skenes carried an expected ERA of 2.63 into July while his real one was almost a run and a half higher thanks to the defense behind him.
Pittsburgh has 50 games left and needs its ace to figure it out if it’s going to make a push for the playoffs.