There’s a clear reason why Paul Skenes is so good.
On Tuesday, Skenes started the All-Star Game for the National League. He ended up throwing a scoreless inning, allowing just one walk on what should have been a strikeout/passed ball to Juan Soto. He wrapped up his inning with the matchup everyone had been waiting for: Skenes vs Aaron Judge.
With a lone 100 MPH fastball, Skenes got Judge to roll over the pitch, and send a grounder to third base for the final out of the inning.
After the outing, it was noted that Skenes remained in the dugout, picking the minds of veteran players. He later told media that he knew this was his opportunity to learn from some of the best, and he came away realizing that he belonged in that group.
What makes Skenes so good, so early in his career, is true confidence.
Confidence is a complex thing. You can have confidence in your abilities, but not yourself. You can have confidence in a present situation, but lose it when things change. Some confidence comes as a result of support from other people, while the lasting form of confidence comes from self-validation.
Skenes has the right type of confidence. He knows that he’s good enough, to the point that when he steps on the mound, a hitter is going to have to work to find his mistake. Even if a hitter gets a hit, Skenes bounces back like a new rubber band in the very next at-bat. He’s going to trust his stuff and his approach, and his stuff and approach are both elite.
Despite that elite combo, Skenes also has the confidence to seek improvements to his game. He’s not afraid of going from the certainty of the moment to the inconspicuousness of the unknown. The results when he does seek change usually end up being elite, very quickly.
In college, Skenes advanced his game in one year with LSU, making adjustments to his mechanics that allowed his present-day 100 MPH fastball. Even with a triple-digit heater and a plus slider, he knew he needed more. So, he worked to develop the splinker, which is currently one of the best pitches in Major League Baseball.
God help hitters when Skenes successfully improves his game to the next level, because since he’s arrived, he’s been one of the best pitchers in the game. And there have been zero signs that he’s going to let up any time soon.
Domingo German Opts Out
A little over one year ago, Domingo German threw a perfect game for the New York Yankees.
This is no easy feat. German was only the 24th pitcher in MLB history to throw a perfect game, and the first since 2012.
What followed the perfect game from German was not good. One year ago today, he allowed five runs in six innings. He followed that with six runs in six innings, raising his season ERA to 4.77. He was then removed from the Yankees rotation.
At the start of August, he had an incident inside the Yankees clubhouse, where he lost his temper, broke a TV, and was ultimately suspended from the team for good, less than six weeks after making MLB history. This was the second off-field incident for German, who also had a domestic violence incident in 2019.
On the field, German has obvious talent. That’s not just shown by the perfect game, but it’s shown throughout his career, with flashes of potentially being one of the best pitchers in the Majors. The problem is that German hasn’t maintained consistency in his results. The bigger problem is the inconsistent results have been paired with those off-field incidents that make you question the nature of the person.
There’s a chicken and the egg situation here.
Is German’s inconsistency on the mound the reason for his off-field incidents?
Or, are the off-field incidents evidence that German can lose it and spiral very quickly, which obviously isn’t a great attribute on the mound?
The Pirates signed German this year to a minor league deal. Their conditions were that he needed to pitch in Triple-A until he showed that he had made the necessary life improvements following last year’s suspension, and multiple alcohol-related incidents off the field. German, even this year, denied that his problem was with alcohol, but showed no indication of what change he needed to make personally.
I respect the Pirates for signing German. This team isn’t going to be a contender for big, elite free agents, nor do they attempt to enter that market. As a result, they need to find people who have talent, and who may lack confidence to consistently apply that talent. Then, they need to instill them confidence.
The problem is that consistent confidence can’t be taught. I don’t know the life history of German, but I do know that his on-field and off-field outcomes point to a guy who can’t maintain a consistent confident level. It hasn’t taken much to get him off his game, away from the elite skills that allowed him to pitch a perfect game.
German has shown that he can be elite for one day. He’s shown that he can be one of the better pitchers in the league for one season. But he’s mostly shown that he gets knocked off his game very easily.
On Tuesday, as Skenes was pitching in the All-Star Game, the Pirates released German. The right-hander had an opt out clause, and with Skenes leading a productive rotation in Pittsburgh, he wasn’t going to make the majors with the Pirates.
It’s not just the MLB rotation that held German back. In ten starts in Triple-A, he had a 5.36 ERA in 50.1 innings. He struck out 48 and walked 28. When the Pirates needed pitching help, they’ve turned to Quinn Priester, and rightfully so. Priester had a 3.21 ERA in 33.2 innings in Triple-A. He showed that he wasn’t allowing things to spiral on him in Triple-A, and the only question was whether he could maintain that confident approach in the majors.
German, on the other hand, was showing more evidence that even Triple-A was too much.
To be fair, German showed improvements toward the end of his time with the Pirates. His final start with the organization saw him throw six innings, allowing two runs, and striking out seven. However, he allowed six runs in 8.2 innings during his previous two starts, so the issue of consistency still remains.
There might be a team in baseball with a rotation that would be willing to gamble on German, without the qualifiers the Pirates put in place. In the last month, three of his five starts have seen 5+ innings and two or fewer runs. Some team might take that as a positive trend in consistency, while ignoring the bad starts sandwiched in between, and the off-field incidents.
I hope German figures it out. I hope something clicks in him that allows him to apply his talents consistently, while also maintaining a confidence off the field which isn’t positively or negatively influenced by outside substances or sources. And I think only one thing needs to click for both of those things to happen: True Confidence.
Teaching True Confidence
I write about prospect development for a living, following the projections and developments of high school and college amateurs to successful MLB careers. What makes the ascent to Major League Baseball so rare is the confidence needed to maintain personal consistency through every start, from A-ball to the Major Leagues.
If you’re a starting pitcher, for every six innings pitched, there are nine opponents who have at least three chances to knock you off your game.
If you’re a hitter, you already deal in a confidence shattering environment where failure is present 70% of the time for the very best. And yet, the guy on the mound wants you to fail 100% of the time.
There are some MLB organizations who believe that development isn’t real. These teams believe that players are either going to be Major Leaguers or they aren’t, and there’s no way to turn a non-Major Leaguer into the person who can play in the Majors. What these teams ultimately believe is that Confidence can’t be taught.
They’re correct in some regard.
I don’t think it would be easy to teach German the confidence that Skenes espouses. I don’t think it would be easy to teach anyone the confidence that Skenes espouses.
Skenes built his confidence through two years at Air Force, learning personal discipline at a military academy. I am personally a pacifist, and cringe every time I travel to Altoona and see a baseball game in rural Pennsylvania interrupted no fewer than six times with military propaganda. I’m also the grandson of a man who was an orphan at age 18, followed by being drafted into World War 2. He then saw his best friend get killed in a spray that shot my grandfather’s helmet off. My grandfather survived to return and start a family that one day led to me, but not after serving in another war to return dead soldiers to their families. I don’t respect the end-result of war, but I do respect the outcome of the training process to prepare future soldiers. They’re literally training for life or death. And I’m saying that as someone who knows how it took one person from having nothing at an early age, to having everything he needed for a good, accomplished life. That same person happened to teach me the art of war before I even picked up a text book. And, he drove my love of the game of baseball. But that’s enough about my complicated view of the military.
It’s almost unfair the training that Skenes has, because baseball is not a game of life or death. It simulates the process in a way. You can annihilate a pitcher, and you can fire bullets past a batter, but they’ll ultimately live to fight in another plate appearance. Only a player’s confidence is at risk of dying.
I do believe that consistent confidence can be taught. It’s not an overnight process, and it only happens if the player is willing to change.
That’s what makes Skenes so good. It’s not that he’s confident and unshakable on the mound. It’s that he’s confident enough to always be seeking upgrade changes to his game, no matter how good he is.
In my years of covering player development, I’ve encountered many “prospect busts” where the public couldn’t figure out how the player didn’t work out. The recurring theme was almost an incorrect or incomplete level of confidence. I won’t name names, but the trend followed a certain pattern:
- Player A has an obvious flaw to his game, but also positives. The positives aren’t enough to overcome the flaw.
- Player A is asked about the flaw and what he’s doing to correct it. He projects confidence in the current approach, seeing no reason to change, for it will eventually work out. It always has, afterall.
- Player A’s obvious flaw ultimately prevents him from advancing toward a Major League career, as he “confidently” trusts his existing game, even with the existing flaw.
If a player isn’t like Skenes, who was sent to a military academy for two years before realizing he could do something special in baseball, then the story is likely common.
The player was the best at an amateur level where 99% won’t make it to pro ball.
The player kept being the best until he reached a talent level where he couldn’t just coast against easy competition.
The player then has to face the truth that his old approach needs adjustments to continue having success.
Some players don’t know how to make an adjustment, for their confidence is rooted in comfortability with an existing approach.
Some players just need an entity bigger than themselves to validate them before they can validate themselves through change. This is where the Pirates went wrong for years.
The Pirates had some of the best pitching prospects in the game, only to see those pitchers go on to have success elsewhere. Tyler Glasnow is the best example of this. The approach by the organization at the time was largely one which removed confidence. It never treated a pitcher like they were enough, always seeking that change needed to eliminate some future forecasted problem. I personally don’t like how I co-signed that approach simply by deferring to the organization as the experts, but I’ve adjusted my approach since then.
The comparison between Glasnow then, and Jared Jones today, shows the difference. Glasnow had two elite pitches as he was on the verge of the majors, and he was told to work on a third pitch before his arrival. Jones had two elite pitches heading into this season, and the Pirates put trust in him that this was enough, while also trusting that he’d continue developing more pitches in the majors. Glasnow eventually had success elsewhere when he was told that his two elite pitches were enough, and when he was given the same opportunity to develop in the majors that Jones has today.
The Pirates are doing a better job today of instilling their pitchers with more confidence, as it can be passed down from the validation of a larger entity.
Still, Jones had to do this on his own. He’s on the record many times as changing his approach over the offseason, in a way that can only be described as gaining personal confidence through changes. He adjusted his fastball, and really he just started to embrace that he was good enough.
Embracing the need for improvements as a positive and necessary aspect to success, while still trusting the present day approach as good enough to be successful, is a very difficult wire to walk.
Developing Confidence
I believe players can be developed. I look at Mitch Keller and Ke’Bryan Hayes as examples.
I’ve had the privilege of covering both of these players from the moment they stepped out of the amateur ranks as high school players, all the way into their Major League careers. I knew very early that each would make it, in this game of mass attrition. They both displayed the same tendency.
Hayes, before he was drafted, took up a mountain biking routine. This allowed him to improve his athleticism and fitness to a point where he could be a first rounder in the draft. He didn’t stop there. When he had a serious injury in A-ball that sapped power, he dedicated his focus to improving his base running. He’s never been one to shy away from change or improvements. The biggest controversy following the Pirates at the end of last year was that Hayes sought out improvements to his game, away from the in-house hitting coaches at PNC Park.
The trend from Hayes is that he’s been able to implement positive changes, even if he still isn’t to his ceiling at the MLB level. I do wonder how much the firing of Jon Nunnally worked against Hayes this year, almost in an opposite way of how a larger entity is supposed to validate a player’s efforts to build confidence. The Pirates definitely didn’t validate the development choice of one of their core players, and that’s a concern.
Keller entered pro ball with a promising mix of pitches, led by a projectable fastball and a curveball he could spin. After his first pro season, he did a lot of work to improve his command and stuff, emerging as a top prospect a year later. He’s only continued those improvements, all the way through pro ball. The last several years have seen him improve year-over-year at the MLB level, while adding a sinker/slider combo that has elevated him to an above-average MLB pitcher. More importantly, he’s been automatic for starter innings, going 49 straight starts with 5+ innings pitched over the last two years.
Keller, like Hayes, has a long history of being able to implement positive changes, very quickly. And he’s still climbing toward a higher ceiling. Neither of these players are the type of people who rest on their accomplishments.
Development isn’t simple, but there is a formula.
You need to first acquire players who are confident in their abilities, but who also are constantly seeking improvement. The only way to have success in the majors is to be looking forward to how you can replicate your success in an ever-evolving game. If a player only focuses on what has made him good in the past, his success will be limited to the past.
Finding players who are amendable to coaching is crucial. Guys like Skenes, who enter pro ball with Major League confidence and Major League stuff, are rare.
The prospect community for years, myself included, have focused on the process of developing stuff to a Major League level. The challenge, and the cause of the high attrition rate in baseball, is developing confidence to a Major League level.
For the Pirates, it helps to have a guy like Skenes on the team as an example for other players to follow.
How important do you think it was for the other 25 players in the MLB clubhouse to see Skenes successfully start the All-Star Game, followed by stating his continued desire for improvements?
How many players in the Pirates organization are resting on their past accomplishments and present-day game as good enough, with that example being set at the top?
The Pirates need to act as a larger entity aimed at instilling confidence in those who need to grow that area of their game.
They’ve done that with pitching, due to the changes in their development approach over the last several years. That’s why I’ve been consistently praising the individualized development approach and open learning system implemented under John Baker. It’s also why you won’t see me reactively calling for Ben Cherington to be fired at every low point, as my hope is what he is “building” is a development system which can instill confidence. And that’s not a switch you can easily flip.
I don’t think the Pirates are quite there yet on the hitting development side. The road to confidence for hitters is much different than for pitchers. I think the Pirates are applying the pitching method to all of their players, which will only work for pitchers. But, the organization itself can always work to change their process for improvements, and I have seen them do this. So, I wait and watch for improved results after adjustments on that side of the development game.
My baseball utopia would be an organization which could take a talented, but troubled guy like German and instantly turn his life around. Because ultimately, throwing a perfect game or winning baseball games consistently across a full season aren’t important to life. Showing the path from German’s lack of consistent confidence to a point where he can be unshakable anywhere he goes is more valuable to developing better human beings for this world through the sport of baseball.
But the reality is that some players can’t be changed, because they are insistent that their current approach isn’t wrong, even with evidence to the contrary.
And I think there’s evidence that German didn’t feel a need to change, which is unfortunate after the opportunity he was given. Here’s to hoping he gets another chance after opting out, and that he capitalizes on it this time around.
Developing the Draft Picks
The Pirates completed their 2024 MLB Draft this week, adding 11 pitchers and 10 position players to their system, including three prep shortstops in their first five picks.
Obviously, they’ll need to develop the confidence and the tools of these players to the point where they can be Major Leaguers.
I wrote a free column yesterday about the draft picks, and the Pirates’ development woes with hitters. Check that out, and follow the Draft Pick Signing Tracker for all of the drafted players who are officially added to the system over the next few weeks.
Pirates Prospect Watch
The rookie leagues are playing this week, but the full-season teams have been off. As a result, I’ve been taking a break from publishing the Pirates Prospect Watch while I focused my energy on the draft.
Today on the site, I’ll be recapping the best hitters and pitchers in the Pirates’ system during the first half. I’ll be recapping the week of rookie ball tomorrow, ahead of the return of full-season action.
I’ve been running this site for 16 MLB seasons, across several variations. This year’s focus is simply seeing if I can do the marathon one last time. Even running a solo site, this is a grind, though not to the burnout extent of also managing and editing contributors on top of my own work.
I very much appreciate all of the readership this year, and especially this past week. Even if there’s no longer a place here for readers to comment, my hope with every article is to keep readers informed, provide something to think about on a deeper level, and ultimately provide an escape from your own quests in applying your skills to your craft in a truly confident manner.
We’re all just trying to be the best versions of ourselves. And we can all take lessons from Paul Skenes in our personal quests.
