Paul Skenes of the Pirates has won the 2024 National League Rookie of the Year award, as voted on by the BBWAA. I happened to be a voter on this award this year, one of the few offseason awards with some actual mystery to it. Ballots get filled out at the end of the regular season (in other words, the playoffs don't count), but I started thinking about this race long before that. And in that vein, I wrote down my thought process all the way to the name I finally checked off. Here goes.
The following was written on Sept. 29:
Greetings from the not-so-distant past. The Mets and Braves have a doubleheader tomorrow -- remember that madness? -- before the playoffs start on Tuesday. Hopefully it was an amazing postseason. I have work to do before we get there, though, and I'm very pleased to do just that.
I have been tasked with a vote for the Jackie Robinson National League Rookie of the Year award by the BBWAA. I take this vote incredibly seriously. What I'm going to do right now is figure out my vote as I'm writing this. I don't know right now which way I'm going to go at the top between Jackson Merrill of the Padres and Paul Skenes of the Pirates.
Now, there are three spots on the ballot and I only know going in who my top two will be, so let's first decide on the third-place vote. The candidates:
- Shota Imanaga, Cubs. bWAR: 3.2/fWAR: 3.0. He came over from Japan and was dominant from the start. He was 15-3 with a 2.91 ERA (138 ERA+), 1.02 WHIP and 174 strikeouts against 28 walks in 173 ⅓ innings. There are some seasons where this would be enough to win the award. We sometimes see complaints about a player like Imanaga being considered a rookie. After all, he spent eight years in NPB (Japan's highest league) and is 30 years old. Still, he's a rookie in MLB, so he's considered on equal footing with everyone else here. The rules are the rules.
- Jackson Chourio, Brewers. bWAR: 3.8/fWAR: 3.9. Chourio debuted on Opening Day at age 20. He had a slow few months and then everything clicked for him. He was especially valuable to the NL Central champs when superstar Christian Yelich went down for the season. Though Chourio was only hitting .222/.276/.354 through June 16, he finishes the season slashing .275/.327/.464 with 29 doubles, four triples, 21 homers, 79 RBI, 80 runs and 22 stolen bases. He's very close to being a five-tool star at this point.
- Masyn Winn, Cardinals. bWAR: 4.9/fWAR: 3.4. Winn scores out as an exceptional defender at shortstop and that part of his game did a ton of heavy lifting on Baseball Reference WAR. He finishes his rookie season in 150 games having hit .267/.314/.416 (102 OPS+) with 32 doubles, five triples, 15 homers, 57 RBI, 85 runs and 11 steals.
Several other players had very impressive rookie seasons, like Gavin Stone, Spencer Schwellenbach, Tobias Myers, Joey Ortiz, Tyler Fitzgerald and Michael Busch, among others. It's just that with only three votes, there wasn't reason to heavily cover any of these guys past the three bullet points above.
I'm going with Chourio. It was a very close call over Imanaga and Winn was a firm, and impressive, fifth for me.
Now, onto the main event.
Jackson Merrill, Padres
bWAR: 4.4. fWAR: 5.2
First things first: This award is for the best rookie. Even if there was a "value" component attached, which there isn't, I believe the most valuable player is the best player. That means that the Padres making the playoffs and being the best team in baseball after the All-Star break don't move the needle at all.
Not that Merrill necessarily needs that extra push. He's been incredible. He hit .292 with a .500 slugging percentage this season. He was moved from shortstop to center field in spring training and started 155 games in center, making a number of highlight-reel catches along the way. He gathered 162 hits, including 31 doubles, six triples and 24 homers. He drove home 90 runs and scored 77. He stole 16 bases.
Merrill was also clutch. He hit six game-tying or go-ahead home run in the eighth inning or later this season, tying inner-circle Hall of Famer Frank Robinson for the most ever by a player 21 years old or younger. He slugged .618 in "late and close" situations with seven homers in 76 at-bats this season. He slugged over .600 in high leverage situations.
He definitely has had a season that feels like a Rookie of the Year winner. He'd easily top any AL candidate. There's someone in the way, though ...
Paul Skenes, Pirates
bWAR: 6.0. fWAR: 4.3
Skenes went 11-3 this season for a sub-par Pirates team. They were 15-8 when he started and 61-78 when he didn't. In his 133 innings, he struck out 170 and only walked 32. He had a 1.96 ERA and 0.95 WHIP. On a rate basis, that's an absolutely outrageous season. Even though his workload was limited by the Pirates' front office, Skenes still racked up more WAR than every NL pitcher except Chris Sale and Zack Wheeler. Only four pitchers had more win probability added (for more on WPA, read here).
We've discussed for years how difficult it is to compare pitchers to hitters for awards, given that pitchers only go once every five days or so. When they do work, pitchers are by far the most important player on the field. How do we account for the most important by a mile but playing one-fifth of the time? It's tough. One of the best arguments I've heard is to try and compare batters faced versus plate appearances. Skenes faced 514 batters while Merrill took 590 plate appearances.
It's clear that Merrill played more, but in using that comparison it doesn't seem like the gap is big enough to disqualify Skenes.
The winner is ...
I really wanted to vote for Merrill because I feel like Skenes is gonna blow him away here and Merrill deserves a ton of credit. Basically, I have a hunch that when we see the final results, my gut reaction will be that Merrill deserved to be closer. I also don't think it's my job here to guess how the other voters will go and then try to make sure a player gets a few more points. The task at hand is to decide who the best rookie in the NL was and I think -- by a razor-thin margin -- it was Skenes.
My ballot:
1. Paul Skenes, Pirates
2. Jackson Merrill, Padres
3. Jackson Chourio, Brewers