BALTIMORE — The Cleveland Guardians head to Pittsburgh for a weekend series that features two of baseball’s most compelling pitching storylines:
Luis Ortiz’s return to face his former team and a showdown with Paul Skenes, the Pirates’ phenom who has taken MLB by storm. The latest Cleveland Baseball Talk podcast dove deep into these narratives, highlighting why this interleague matchup carries extra significance beyond the usual standings implications.
For Ortiz, Friday night’s start represents a homecoming in the truest sense. After being developed through the Pirates’ system and making his MLB debut with Pittsburgh, he now returns as a visitor to PNC Park for the first time. As podcast host Joe Noga pointed out, “Ortiz had 10 strikeouts in his last outing and now he gets to go back to the team that he came up with and face them.”
The timing couldn’t be better for Ortiz, who enters this start on a high note after delivering his best performance of the season against Kansas City, striking out 10 batters over 5 2/3 innings while allowing just one run. This recent success suggests he’s finding his rhythm after changing organizations.
“He’s coming off two good starts,” veteran baseball writer Paul Hoynes noted. “The last one was his best start of the season. Five and two thirds, one run allowed, 10 strikeouts. And he pitched well against the Angels before that. He’s kind of finding his footing.”
The emotional component of this start can’t be overlooked. “It’s going to be really interesting to see how he handles the homecoming because that’s the only organization he came up in,” Hoynes said. “Cleveland is just his second organization. He was signed and developed by the Pirates, came up through the minor league system. So I’m sure he’s got a lot of friends there.”
While Ortiz’s return provides Friday’s headline, Saturday’s game features an even bigger draw: Paul Skenes, the Pirates’ young superstar who has become not just a baseball sensation but a cultural phenomenon. The 2023 first overall draft pick has lived up to the enormous hype surrounding him, compiling an impressive resume in his rookie season.
“This will be the first time Cleveland gets a look at him,” Hoynes explained. “He was one of one in 2023, the top draft pick in the country. He’s the NL Rookie of the Year, started the All-Star game and finished third in Cy Young voting. I mean, you couldn’t ask for anything better from a rookie pitcher year.”
Skenes represents a formidable challenge for Cleveland’s hitters, especially with his current form. “He’s 2 and 1 with a 2.96 ERA in four starts,” Hoynes noted. “It’s going to be entertaining to see just what the plan is by the Cleveland’s hitters against Skenes, who is one of the most dominant pitchers in the game right now.”
Adding to Skenes’ mystique is his off-field celebrity status as the partner of social media star Livvy Dunne, with the couple recently featured in Vanity Fair. As Hoynes succinctly put it: “It’s good to be Paul Skenes. You’re 6-foot-5, 250 pounds, first round pick overall. You get to the big leagues in one year and you start the All-Star game. I mean it doesn’t get much better than that.”
Don’t miss this weekend’s series filled with compelling storylines, emotional returns, and star power! Tune into the Cleveland Baseball Talk Podcast for the complete preview and analysis of what promises to be one of the most interesting interleague matchups of the early season.
If the player above doesn’t work, you can listen to today’s podcast here.
Note: Artificial intelligence was used to help generate this story from the Cleveland Baseball Talk Podcast by cleveland.com. Visitors to cleveland.com have asked for more text stories based on website podcast discussions.
