Really, it’s all about the mustache.
Yes, Paul Skenes and Bubba Chandler have a lot in common. They’re big, strong, right-handed pitchers for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
They both arrived with huge prospect pedigrees.
They both have the potential to pull this franchise out of the dumps and lead them into a new era.
But the mustaches bring it all together. They look really gosh darn similar.
Is Bubba Chandler related to Paul Skenes?
No, Bubba Chandler is not related to Paul Skenes.
Chandler is from Lawrenceville, Georgia.
Skenes is from Fullerton, California.
No, that technically wouldn’t stop them from being related, but it helps drive the point home.
These two similar people just so happened to wind up in the same place at the same time looking quite similar.
Sometimes, the world works in mysterious ways.
That’s particularly true in baseball, where you never know what you’re going to see on a given day.
In this case, it’s a promoted Pirates phenom who looks all sorts of the same as their last promoted phenom.
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Did Bubba Chandler play football?
Yes, Bubba Chandler was a star quarterback.
That’s part of where his story has a fun twist, much like Skenes, although not the same kind of twist.
Skenes went to Air Force as a slugging catcher who also closed games.
Chandler could have gone to Clemson to play baseball and play quarterback.
Skenes eventually ended up as a dominant starting pitcher at LSU, and Chandler opted against going to college.
Both could’ve followed different paths.
But their choices led them to Pittsburgh as Pirates teammates, and now they’ll try to turn this franchise around.
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