Nothing has given me planning-for-the-future-gone-bad vibes lately than the statement, “the Pittsburgh Pirates should trade Paul Skenes.” It reminds me of an armchair-quarterback argument a fan shoots out with no substance.

If you’re not a baseball fan, Skenes is the 23-year-old phenom, the beacon of hope for the future of baseball, the star with a 1.91 ERA this season, the guy with over a strikeout per inning this year.

Are we seriously talking about this?

To be clear, though, Pirates general manager Ben Cherington has said trading Skenes before the July 31 deadline is not part of his plan, but rumors have continued to float. It’s fun to grapple with trade scenarios, especially when it involves contending teams. But in doing so, it’s easy to forget the Pirates aren’t an experiment; they’re a Major League team hoping to build something special — and that starts with Skenes. 

Trading Skenes, now or in the offseason, would be catastrophic to fans, players, the manager, the entire franchise, the rebuild itself. He is the rebuild; the rebuild, as it stands, cannot survive without him. It’s one thing to dump a star before they hit free agency to get something in return, but it’s another to trade a young phenom with years of team control on their contract –– Skenes isn’t a free agent until after the 2029 season –– and the light shining on the organization.

To me, he is the dream player for Pittsburgh. He’s young. He’s a starting pitcher. He’s on the way to becoming the best, if he isn’t already. He’s under contract. What’s the benefit of trading him now? They have years with him. Years. Is it less pressure to win soon? 

When we say the Pirates must trade him because they essentially have no hope to be good enough to convince him to re-sign in four years, are we admitting that the MLB has a flawed system? Are we admitting that the gap between the top five teams and the bottom five teams is so large that a team at the bottom can’t make its way to the top — or at least close enough to have a fighter’s chance in the playoffs — over the course of 10 or 12 years (about how long Skenes has until the end of his prime)? I think so, but that’s for another day. 

Why is the Pirates’ record such a big part of this –– and why does it matter more that he is on a bad team? I get that fans want him in the playoffs, competing for championships, and wonder if he’ll reach those with Pittsburgh. I get the get-as-big-a-return-package argument, too, but even that feels empty or borderline-disrespectful to his greatness. He’s a generational talent. How can we honestly say the Pirates should trade him for the good of the franchise?

The problem with trading for prospects is that they are, well, prospects. There’s no guarantee with any prospect, but there’s hope with each one, hope they can contribute to something special down the line. And all the things people say could go wrong with Skenes could go wrong with a prospect. The difference? In Skenes, Pittsburgh has the ultimate prospect, a pitcher entering his prime who broke records as a rookie. With Skenes, the Pirates know they have the face of the franchise and trading him away would diminish any thought that things could turn around.

Think about it. How many times do we see a player under 25 and universally accept he’s a star? Not many. Furthermore, when do we see the young star traded for prospects? Not often, either. The most recent example is when the Washington Nationals traded a 23-year-old Juan Soto to the San Diego Padres during the 2022 season. Time will tell if that pays off, although it has looked good in the early days of those prospects’ careers. But at the same time, it feels different to trade an ace, the guy who will pitch a gem every five days, the rarest, most precious commodity in baseball.

And of course, there’s risk in waiting to trade him. He could get hurt or he could start struggling. But couldn’t we say the same about Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, or Bobby Witt Jr.? Ohtani did get hurt and his pitching career was in jeopardy, but whether the Dodgers made a mistake with his contract wasn’t a major talking point. Injuries are part of sports, and they can’t be planned for, especially when it comes to stars like Skenes, Judge, Ohtani, and Witt Jr. 

It reminds me of an adage I learned from my dad: that if you try too hard to plan for the long-term future or what could go wrong in hopes of avoiding problems, you risk missing the journey there and the steps along that path that could’ve incrementally led you to your goals. That’s what Pittsburgh would be doing if they traded Skenes; they’d be showing more concern with a problem, whether a potential injury or lapse in effectiveness, that they don’t, and may never, have than in a potential solution to a problem they know they have –– losing.