It’s fair to wonder where the New York Yankees would be without budding young ace Cam Schlittler.
Luckily, Schlittler is both healthy and rightfully earning his flowers, since he was named the midseason American League Cy Young winner, narrowly edging out Dylan Cease of the rival Toronto Blue Jays.
Schlittler was named the best AL pitcher by The Athletic, which released its midseason awards Friday. Schittler is 9-5 with a 2.01 ERA, 0.93 WHIP and 131 strikeouts in 112 innings entering his final first-half start Saturday against the Washington Nationals.
Schlittler has been elite but also extremely valuable since Yankees starters Gerrit Cole, Max Fried and Carlos Rodon have all spent time on the injured list.
Cam Schlittler is the AL Cy Young Ahead of Dylan Cease
Schlittler has been the second-best starter in the majors, behind only Jacob Misiorowski of the Milwaukee Brewers, and Yankees fans would scream Schlittler’s credentials from the top of a mountain.
But Stark had a harder time distinguishing between Schlittler and Cease, who is pitching in Year 1 of an eight-year contract he signed in Toronto off its AL pennant-winning season in 2025.
“Obviously, Schlittler is a great choice,” Stark wrote. “But the more I thought about it, the more I realized he wasnât the only choice.”
Cease is 6-4 with a spectacular 2.56 ERA and 148 strikeouts, which leads the AL and only trails Misiorowski for the major-league lead. Cease just came three outs from a no-hitter against the San Francisco Giants and has a 1.73 ERA and 56 strikeouts in 36 1/3 innings since June 1.
“He has a (slightly) higher strikeout rate than Jacob Misiorowski! (Itâs 13.546 per nine innings for Cease, 13.541 for Miz.). That got my attention,” Stark wrote. “Not to mention the âexpectedâ stats are trying to convince us Cease has actually been better than Schlittler. Cease leads the AL in both Expected ERA (2.85) and Fielding Independent Pitching (2.20). Schlittler is at 2.94 and 2.58, respectively.”
Still, Stark went with Schlittler thanks to his innings and superior ERA, which were “just too big” to ignore.
Cam Schlittler is Having a Historically Great Season for the Yankees
In the post-pitchers-win era of baseball, Schlittler’s record isn’t especially eye-popping at the All-Star break. His ERA is great, but it has gone up from 1.50 over his past seven outings.
Yet, Stark spelled just how spectacular the 6-6 righty has been in his first full season in the majors, especially in the context of Yankees history by starting with his 210 ERA+, which is first in the AL.
“You know how many Yankees have ever had an ERA+ of 209 or better over a full season? Zero would be a stupendous guess,” Stark wrote. “Ron Guidry made it to 208 in 1978. Spud Chandler was at 198 in 1943. But itâs wild to see that Whitey Ford, Roger Clemens, CC Sabathia, Catfish Hunter, etc., never even got close.”
When you’re comparing a pitcher’s to Guidry’s in 1978 — undisputedly the best pitching season in Yankees history when he went 25-3 with a 1.74 ERA and nine shutouts while winning the Cy Young and finished second in AL MVP voting — you know it’s otherworldly.
So Schlittler’s start to this season is unprecedented in Yankees history. Clemens in 2001 (20-3, 3.51 ERA), Cole in 2023 (15-4, 2.63 ERA) and Guidry in ’78 all won the Cy Young, and if Schlittler keeps this up and doesn’t win it — a la Andy Pettitte in 1996 — something will be seriously wrong.
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