Twins Daily Draft Preview: Paul Skenes

Who is He?
Paul Skenes is a generational talent who just completed his junior year leading the LSU Tigers to the National Championship. He spent his first two years pitching for Air Force Academy (the former home of current Twins reliever Griffin Jax). Skenes transferred before he would be required to put his baseball career on pause as Jax had to do before committing to baseball full-time.

And Wes Johnson unlocked a pitcher rarely seen in the college ranks. Skenes has an 80-grade fastball that routinely hits triple-digits, a plus-slider that will give hitters fits and a usable change-up that he will continue to develop. He's also actually a very good hitter as well and jokes that he wants to hit too. He might not give Shohei Ohtani a run for best two-way player in the MLB, but there's no doubt that he's a different type.

At 6' 6" and over 230 pounds, Skenes checks every box that you'd look for in a future MLB ace.

Why the Twins Will Draft Him
It should be as simple as "if, by act of divine intervention, the teams drafting in the first four spots forget about Paul Skenes, the Twins need to rush to the podium to draft him." Skenes would cost a king's ransom on the open market, so getting six years of service for pennies on the dollar is one of the greatest heists in sports. He'd be an organizational asset that could, potentially, net more than any other signal player in all of baseball (when you factor in cost in terms of prospects and what a team would have to pay him contractually). It would be a no-brainer. If he's available: Draft the man. Pay the man. And, probably, consider pitching him during the stretch run if you need to.

(Many of these same things can be said about Dylan Crews, too, who we didn't profile. The likelihood of either player falling to the Twins is relatively slim.)

Why the Twins Won’t Draft Him
Well, because Skenes will be gone. The Nationals, according to rumors, can't wait to draft him at #2 and the only thing that would make them reconsider is if Dylan Crews is available. In that event, it would be hard to imagine that the Tigers would pass on him at #3 (and wouldn't that be lovely in the American League Central). 

A Skenes-tumble would, for all intents and purposes, have to do with excessive salary demands and, though the Twins are one of the most well-equipped teams to meet anyone's demands, it's possible that they would balk at punting the rest of the draft to draft him. Personally, I don't think it would be outrageous to sacrifice other picks to pay Skenes more, but I'm not running a draft room or signing the checks.

Unless a catastrophic injury gets in the way, Paul Skenes will be a multi-time All-Star, a perennial Cy Young contender and will make hundreds of millions of dollars for being really, really good at throwing a baseball.

What do you think of Paul Skenes as a prospect? How would you feel about the Twins taking him fifth overall in the Draft? Join the discussion in the comments.

Previous Draft Articles and Profiles
Walker Jenkins
Max Clark
Noble Meyer
Rhett Lowder
Jacob Gonzalez
Jacob Wilson
Wyatt Langford
Kyle Teel
Chase Dollander

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