Pirates Predicted to Have Second-Straight Rookie of Year
The Pittsburgh Pirates may have only been scratching the surface with their young pitching with Paul Skenes turning in a historic rookie season and Jared Jones flashing front of the rotation stuff in 2024.
On the heels of Skenes winning the National League Rookie of the Year, Pittsburgh may have another arm coming up the pipeline who could earn the same award next season. MLB.com's Jonathan Mayo predicted Pirates right-handed pitching prospect Bubba Chandler will win the NL Rookie of the Year in 2025. Chandler is the Pirates' No. 1 ranked prospect and No. 15 in baseball by MLB Pipeline.
Overall, Chandler is the No. 2 pitching prospect in baseball by MLB Pipeline. Along with Chandler's strong finish to 2024, Mayo cited the Pirates including right-handed starting pitcher Luis Ortiz in the trade to the Cleveland Guardians for left-handed hitting first baseman Spencer Horwitz as a sign that their prospect could make his 2025 debut sooner rather than later.
"With the way Bubba Chandler finished last year at Triple-A, he’s close," Mayo writes. "Pittsburgh had a fairly deep rotation at the big league level, so I wasn’t sure how that was going to work. And this is where the Spencer Horwitz trade comes into play, because in that trade the Pirates sent Luis Ortiz to Cleveland, so that creates a little bit more of an opening in my book."
Chandler went 10-7 with a 3.08 ERA and struck out 148 batters over 119.2 innings across Double-A Altoona and Triple-A Indianapolis. In Indianapolis, Chandler made seven starts, going 4-0 with a 1.83 ERA and struck out 54 batters over 39.1 innings pitched while holding opposing hitters to a .183 batting average.
Mayo also noted the Pirates' patience with Skenes last season, as he started last season in Indianapolis before making his big league debut on May 11 last season. Even if Pittsburgh takes a similar route with Chandler, he believes the Pirates' top prospect will have a good shot to give them their second straight rookie of the year.
"They have some other options, I know," Mayo writes. "But for me, that opens an avenue for Bubba Chandler to hit the rotation sooner rather than later. Is it Opening Day? I don’t know. But Paul Skenes wasn’t on the Opening Day roster and he ended up being Rookie of the Year."
