The Paul Skenes stuff won't stop this offseason until he's throwing a pitch for the Pittsburgh Pirates this upcoming year.
That's not going to excuse many from throwing him in trade packages that don't make too much sense.
No matter what the trade package says it is, there's absolutely no reason for the Pirates to move on from Skenes.
Unless they were to be offered Shohei Ohtani and every prospect in the Los Angeles Dodgers system, I don't see why they’d ever move on from a player who's the best starter in Major League Baseball and isn't a free agent until 2030.
From top to bottom, it'd be a major disaster in Pittsburgh if it did that.
However, not only do some believe that Skenes could be traded for a package that doesn't include Ohtani, which we obviously know isn't going to happen for many reasons – you get the point – but they still think he can end up with the Dodgers for just prospects.
The latest to suggest that could be the case was Jake Elman of FanSided, who said the Dodgers make the most sense because of their farm system.
“Although Pirates general manager Ben Cherrington recently reiterated that Skenes will pitch for Pittsburgh in 2026, he also said the quiet part out loud in admitting he knows that teams will always ask about Skenes. You shouldn’t need us to explain why you should want your favorite team to trade for Skenes, who just captured his first Cy Young Award.
“Which team makes the most sense? Los Angeles Dodgers. Yes, we know how unfair this sounds. However, the Dodgers have arguably the sport’s top farm system, and we feel comfortable predicting that they won’t be afraid to offer Skenes a record-setting contract for full-time pitchers,” he wrote. “Paul Skenes, you are a Los Angeles Dodger!”
Not to say the Dodgers don't have a decent farm system, but it's also very overrated.
And I mean that in the sense that the Dodgers over the past few years have had one of the best prospect ranks in baseball, and a lot of their prospects ended up getting dealt and don't do much at the big league level.
It's similar to the New York Yankees, where a lot of the prospects get hyped up for some reason.
Plus, the Pirates should absolutely not send him to the Dodgers. If we think baseball is already broken with Los Angeles, it'd be 10 times worse.