Kevin Gorman

I think it's a shoe-in.

It's more a question of who's going to start the home opener.

No, I think the classic final is like on March 14th or 15th or something like that.

Skeens told us this week that he is scheduled to pitch in one of the exhibition games next week.

And then he's going to pitch in one of the pool play around games.

And he's also scheduled to pitch in one of the championship round games.

And now they play quarterfinal, semifinal, final.

I don't know if that means he's – he said they've known the schedule for months, that it's already been scripted.

So he knows when he's pitching.

He's not going to reveal that.

But I can't imagine if Tarek Skubal is not pitching more than one game, if he's going to return to Tigers camp early, that Skeens isn't the guy.

I mean, if you're the USA and you get a rematch with Japan and you want somebody who's going to face Shohei Otani and all the other stars on that Japanese team, who else would you want on the mound other than Paul Skeens?

And I think at that point, you know, Paul Skeens is going to be ready to go, you know, at least five, six innings, if not deeper into the game.

I mean, he's already at the pitch count now where he's, you know, throwing more than 50 pitches when everybody else was throwing 30.

No, this guy's different.

He's a horse.

I mean, he is a, he's, Paul Skeens, if there's any, I don't think, you know, and I've talked to some people in the Pirates about this.

There's always concern that Paul Skeens could get hurt, whether it's a grapefruit loop game, whether it's a live batting practice at Pirate City, or whether it's a regular season game or the WBC.

There's always a concern that you're going to lose a guy to an arm injury, especially one who throws as hard as he does.

But if there's ever anybody who prepares himself for every moment and does the proper...