Should Pirates have called up Paul Skenes sooner? Derek Shelton defends team's handling of All-Star rookie

There are two ways to look what Paul Skenes making the All-Star Game says about the Pirates’ handling of him this season, and they’re vastly different schools of thought.

One position is that it validates Pittsburgh’s decision to slowplay things with him early on. The other is that he was always ready and the Pirates essentially buried Skenes in Triple-A in April and early May at the expense of the Major League team.

Pirates manager Derek Shelton sooner thinks it’s an endorsement of how Skenes was handled.

When Skenes was taken first overall in the MLB Draft last year, it long had been expected he would blossom into one of the game’s elite arms. But his rapid rise has to stardom has been unprecedented, with the 22-year-old getting named a National League All-Star less than a year after he was drafted. He's 5-0 across 10 starts with a 2.12 ERA 1.011 WHIP.

Skenes debuting in the majors this season wasn’t a surprise, especially given the spring that he had. He made a strong case to break camp with the big club, but the Pirates instead thought Triple-A was the best starting point for Skenes, who to that point hadn’t pitched above Double-A.

But as Skenes shoved in one start after another with Indy, the clamors for him to get called up kept rising until the Pirates finally made the decision in early May. With the Pirates in the thick of the National League playoff hunt, it’s fair to wonder if Pittsburgh did itself a disservice by waiting for Skenes.

“I think it just speaks to how good a job that our baseball ops group did in terms of identifying that he was the guy to get,” Shelton said Tuesday in his weekly appearance on 93.7 The Fan. “We talk a lot about pitching and pitching development and I know people were critical of what we did with him early in the year, but we needed to make sure he was healthy to pitch in the big leagues and we needed to make sure he was going to have the innings once he got here and he was going to be able to pitch.

“Since he’s been here he’s been able to pitch seven innings three or four times and he’s done a really good job. It’s surprising because you’ve never seen it happen, but this kid is extremely talented and he’s special.”

Ultimately, the Pirates were never expected to be a bona fide contender this year, so taking their time with Skenes always was the most pragmatic approach. But regardless the source of his success, Skenes is making clear he’ll be a staple atop the rotation for a long time.