Chourio finishes third in NL Rookie of the Year Award voting

MILWAUKEE -- Brewers outfielder Jackson Chourio finished third in NL Rookie of the Year Award balloting on Monday, tying a bow on a special debut for the youngest player to appear in a Major League game this season.

Pirates pitcher Paul Skenes won the award after appearing first on 23 of the 30 ballots cast by the Baseball Writers' Association of America. Padres outfielder Jackson Merrill received the other seven first-place votes and finished third ahead of Chourio, who finished third on 26 ballots.

The other four third-place votes went to Cubs left-hander Shota Imanaga.

• Past Rookie of the Year Award winners

For Chourio, it was one final homage to a rookie season that started slow -- he had a .575 OPS through June 1 -- but ended with a flourish. Chourio hit .305/.360/.528 from June 2 through the end of the regular season, with 16 of his 21 home runs and 15 of his 22 stolen bases, becoming the first player to secure a 20-20 season before his 21st birthday.

Chourio earned that distinction by the thinnest of margins, since the Angels’ Mike Trout attained 20-20 status on his 21st birthday in 2012. But that’s company Chourio will gladly share.

“I started thinking a little bit more about having fun,” Chourio said during Monday’s awards show on MLB Network, with agent Cesar Suarez translating. “There was a little bit of pressure in the beginning, but when I saw that [Christian] Yelich went down, I started having fun with the team. I feel that the chemistry of the team was so good that it helped me get the momentum to finish strong like I did.”

The pressure came from Chourio’s status as the No. 2 prospect in baseball, according to MLB Pipeline, and from an eight-year, $82 million contract. When he signed it on Dec. 4, it set a record for a player without a day in the Majors.

It proved a wise investment. After a season full of sentences that began with, “Chourio was the youngest player since …” there was one more entry last week when finalists were announced: Chourio was the youngest player to finish in the top three of Rookie of the Year Award balloting since 19-year-old Juan Soto of the Nationals in 2018.

In fact, over the past 40 years, only four top-three finishers were younger than Chourio on the final day of the regular season:

Ken Griffey Jr., 1989 (19 years, 314 days old)
Dwight Gooden, 1984 (19, 319)
Juan Soto, 2018 (19, 341)
Bryce Harper, 2012 (19, 353)
Chourio, 2024 (20, 203)

Chourio had been bidding to join Pat Listach (1992), Ryan Braun (2007) and Devin Williams (2020) as Rookie of the Year Award winners from the Brewers. Chourio would have been the youngest player to win the award since Harper.

But Skenes and Merrill were the favorites going into Monday’s presentation. Skenes, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2023 MLB Draft, was 11-3 with a 1.96 ERA in 23 Major League starts. Merrill had an .826 OPS after shifting from shortstop to the outfield to squeeze onto San Diego’s Opening Day roster.

Awards week continues Tuesday with another Brewers finalist: Pat Murphy, who is bidding to become the first Milwaukee skipper to win a Manager of the Year Award in either league. He’s one of three finalists in the NL manager category, with Carlos Mendoza of the Mets and Mike Shildt of the Padres.

“[Murphy] always trusted in me,” Chourio said. “He always told me, ‘You have to understand that this is a process for you. You’re in the big leagues. Everything is going to get better for you. Keep doing what you’re doing, working hard.’

“That was one of the most important things that happened for me to finish the way I did.”