The Pittsburgh Pirates must face the music when it comes to Paul Skenes.

Pittsburgh Pirates fans don't have a whole lot to be excited about outside of Paul Skenes, who has already established himself as one of baseball's best pitchers in just his second big-league season.

Unfortunately, Skenes has already found himself at the center of trade speculation, this even though he is under team control through 2029 and technically hasn't even pitched a full season yet (he will be the end of this year).

To be fair, the Pirates rebuffed all Skenes inquiries back at the trade deadline, but that does not mean chatter won't resurface over the winter, especially given Pittsburgh's reputation.

Bleacher Report's Tim Kelly has slapped the Pirates with a harsh reality check in that regard, wondering if they will actually be able to build a winner around the superstar right-hander.

"The Pirates may never have a World Series team with Skenes, who will likely price his way out of their financial comfort zone in the not-so-distant future," Kelly wrote. "But it can't just be that they bring Andrew McCutchen back every year as a way to try to distract fans from the fact that the owner is unwilling to spend. And if he's unable to, then he should sell the team."

In other words, Pittsburgh should at least try to put together a contender, something the Pirates haven't really done for the last three-plus decades.

Pittsburgh has made just three playoff appearances since 1993, with all of them coming between 2013 and 2015. Otherwise, the Bucs have been baseball's laughing stock.

The Pirates haven't drafted well. They haven't made good trades. They haven't made shrewd free-agent signings. They really haven't done much of anything right as an organization outside of selecting Skenes with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 MLB Draft, and that was pretty much a no-brainer.

Skenes made 23 starts during his rookie campaign, going 11-3 with a 1.96 ERA while allowing just 94 hits and registering 170 strikeouts over 133 innings of work. Through 30 starts this year, the 23-year-old has pitched to the tune of a 1.92 ERA, which leads the majors. He has surrendered 125 hits while racking up 203 punchouts across 173 frames.

The Pirates will surely get approached with some monster offers for Skenes in a couple of months. We'll see what they decide to do.