Generational Arms: Skenes’ Historic Unanimity Meets Skubal’s Back-to-Back Brilliance

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The 2025 MLB season was a year of pitching dominance led by two young aces who have cemented their status as the future of the game. In a powerful statement that disregarded team records and validated next-generation metrics, the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) crowned Paul Skenes and Tarik Skubal as the 2025 Cy Young Award winners.

National League: Paul Skenes, Unanimous Star

The ascension of Paul Skenes has reached historic speeds. The Pittsburgh Pirates right-hander, just one year removed from winning the National League Rookie of the Year award, followed it up by capturing the NL Cy Young Award in unanimous fashion.

Historic Pace: Skenes is the first starting pitcher since Dwight Gooden (1985) to win the Cy Young Award the season immediately following his Rookie of the Year campaign.
The Unanimous Decision: Skenes received all 30 first-place votes, becoming the first unanimous NL winner since Sandy Alcantara in 2022. He left no doubt in the minds of the voters, despite playing for a last-place Pirates team that finished 10 games under .500.
Dominant Numbers: Skenes led all of Major League Baseball with a minuscule 1.97 ERA over $187\frac{2}{3}$ innings. He also set a Pirates franchise record for strikeouts by a right-hander with 216 K’s.
Winning Without Wins: His final record stood at 10-10, but this mark was irrelevant to voters who focused on his elite peripheral stats, including an NL-leading FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) and an impressive 0.95 WHIP.

American League: Tarik Skubal Goes Back-to-Back

In the American League, Tarik Skubal proved his 2024 win was no fluke, earning the AL Cy Young Award for the second consecutive season as the anchor of the Detroit Tigers’ rotation.

Joining Rare Company: Skubal becomes the first AL pitcher to win back-to-back Cy Young Awards since Hall of Famer Pedro Martínez (1999-2000). He also joins Denny McLain as the only Tigers pitcher with multiple Cy Youngs.
Best in the AL: The left-hander received 26 of 30 first-place votes, dominating a strong field that included runner-up Garrett Crochet of the Boston Red Sox.
Statistical Leader: Skubal backed up his repeat bid with an AL-best 2.21 ERA and led the American League in ERA+ (187) and FIP. He also set a career-high with 241 strikeouts over $195\frac{1}{3}$ innings, demonstrating an elite combination of power and durability.
Clutch Consistency: Tigers Manager A.J. Hinch praised Skubal’s command and consistency, noting that his K/BB ratio of 7.30 led all MLB-qualified pitchers.

The Future is Now

The 2025 Cy Young announcements were a powerful endorsement of the youth movement sweeping through MLB pitching. With both Skenes (23) and Skubal (turning 29 this month) widely regarded as the two best pitchers in baseball, the stage is set for a long-running rivalry that will define pitching excellence for years to come.