Baseball, at all levels, is in the midst of a marketing journey. Some might call it a marketing crisis.
The backbone of the NBA’s current image has been built on the big personalities of star players. Whenever there’s a plethora, the ratings go through the roof, and when there’s a lack, debates swirl on who the next one could be. Many of the biggest players cross into being “celebrities” over professional athletes, making them easy to push to the front of a TV screen.
For the NFL, the quarterback position is American royalty. With one position being the center of the game idiosyncratically from any other sport, even just the good quarterbacks can find themselves at the top of the rundown for daytime television.
The game of baseball does not necessarily allow for the few big personalities – the most “marketable” players – that sport does have to be shown off or flaunted, either by the league or the individual. Even the most household names can feel lost in the media landscape.
Mike Trout is a statistical anolomie, but is a bland personality tucked away in an even blander Los Angeles Angels franchise. Aaron Judge is a beheboth who’s home run spectacles are highlighted by wearing a Yankees uniform, but he doesn’t have an “edge” the way many of our favorite athletes do. Shoehi Ohtani is unique and gifted enough to be a wonder of the sports world, but his language barrier will always set a hard cap on his domestic popularity.
It hasn’t been all fully failed experiments. Bryce Harper is recognized everywhere, but he hasn’t had the full body of post-season success needed to be a “mega star” that non-sports fans could identify with a photograph. Fernando Tatis Jr. had all the boxes checked – height, age, style of play, charisma – but his off the field woes with PEDs and a motorcycle accident made it so that he just wasn’t present enough.
But the MLB might have found what they’re looking for, and not in the way they expected.
Pittsburgh Pirates starting pitcher Paul Skenes has become one of the most gravitational players in baseball seemingly overnight. How could a starting pitcher, someone who appears on television once or twice a week, for an uncompetitive small-market team be such an instant sensation? It’s weird, but surprisingly simple.
For starters, Skenes become the organic, publically recognized face of college baseball. When Skenes’ LSU Tigers won the Men’s College World Series (MCWS) in 2023, it was the most viewed MCWS on ESPN since they started televising the event in 1980 at 2.86 million viewers averaged. Skenes, who felt like the first “mega prospect” baseball had seen in about a decade, was the face of a championships series loaded with star power. Teammate Dylan Crews and opposing Florida Gator Wyatt Langford would both be selected in the top four of the 2023 MLB Draft – Skenes made both feel tiny. College baseball felt big; it felt important.
It helps that Skenes is unique not just to watch but also look at. At 6’7″ with arguably the most recognizable mustach in sports, he commands attention of broadcasts and social media feeds – two small details that make a big contrast.
When he was drafted first overall to the Pirates, it was a big deal that attracted a lot of attention. He felt like a prospect that superseded the market he went to – no matter who picked him up, it would attract attention. Sometimes prospects only get the recognition they deserve when they play for a blue chip franchise with a lot of national coverage. For Skenes, that didn’t matter.
Even the biggest prospects and names in college baseball can become lost in the shuffle due to the methodical nature of the making your way through a team’s farm system. Rather than being put on the main stage, talented players have the rummage their way through the pipeline, conceilint them for two years – sometimes up to four. Luckily, Skenes’ pitstop in the minor leagues was very brief, not even spending a full season there before making his Pirates debut on May 11, 2024. A day that Alex Stumpf of MLB.com said “could go down as one of the most important days for the Pirates in the 21st century”.
Skenes won the NL Rookie of the Year award in 2024 and started for the National League in the MLB All Star game, setting himself up for early success. As he likely continues to improve, the MLB will look to him as a focus of their marketing to get more fans interested in small market teams immediately and base his success as a model for other prospect with different teams.
Written By Anders Pryor