{"id":662427,"date":"2026-04-04T07:53:50","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T07:53:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662427\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T07:53:50","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T07:53:50","slug":"paul-skenes-hypes-difference-maker-konnor-griffin-after-19-year-olds-mlb-debut-for-pirates","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/662427\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Skenes Hypes &#8216;Difference-Maker&#8217; Konnor Griffin After 19-Year-Old&#8217;s MLB Debut for Pirates"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Pittsburgh Pirates rookie shortstop Konnor Griffin made his long-awaited MLB debut on Friday against the Baltimore Orioles and burst onto the scene with an RBI double in his first at-bat.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">The first MLB teenage position player since Juan Soto (2018) ultimately helped lead Pittsburgh to a 5-4 win, per the <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/mlb\/story\/_\/id\/48390229\/difference-maker-konnor-griffin-19-stars-bat-glove-pirates-debut\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Associated Press<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Pirates star pitcher and reigning National League Cy Young winner Paul Skenes remarked on his impact postgame.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">&#8220;He&#8217;s a difference-maker, it was very apparent today,&#8221; Skenes said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Griffin knocked in the game&#8217;s first run and scored its second after Jared Triolo followed the rookie&#8217;s double with an RBI single. Henry Davis then added an RBI double before Oneil Cruz smacked an RBI single to give Pittsburgh a 4-0 edge in the second inning. The Pirates withstood a late Baltimore comeback for the win.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Griffin is the No. 1 player on <a class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-inherit MuiLink-root MuiLink-underlineAlways MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__ui__link__medium_strong css-lu48cp\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mlb.com\/milb\/prospects\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer nofollow\">MLB.com&#8217;s<\/a> Top 100 prospect list. The No. 9 overall pick in the 2024 MLB draft dominated over three levels of minors in 2025 (Single-A, High-A, Double-A), hitting .333 (.941 OPS) with 21 home runs and 94 RBI in 122 games. He hit .438 in five games with Triple-A Indianapolis this year before getting called to the bigs.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MuiTypography-root MuiTypography-bp_small__body__article__medium css-1vqr2el\">Pittsburgh has now won three straight to move to 4-3 and will host Baltimore again on Saturday at 4:05 p.m. ET.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pittsburgh Pirates rookie shortstop Konnor Griffin made his long-awaited MLB debut on Friday against the Baltimore Orioles and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":662428,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2276],"tags":[5,2291,4,1586],"class_list":{"0":"post-662427","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb-draft","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-major-league-baseball-draft","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-mlb-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116345361449422176","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=662427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/662427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/662428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=662427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=662427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=662427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}