On August 2 2024, a 23-year-old Cam Schlittler started a game for the New York Yankees’ High-A affiliate, the Hudson Valley Renegades. In 5.0 innings, he gave up only one run on six hits and one walk, striking out nine, and leaving with the win.
On August 25 2025, a 24-year-old Cam Schlittler started a game for the New York Yankees against the Washington Nationals. In 6.0 innings, he gave up no runs on four hits and three walks, striking out eight, and leaving with the win.
The results were the same. But the level of competition was completely, vastly different. And yet given how aggressively Schlittler attacks the zone against Major League hitters – and how effective his stuff is within it – you would not know he had nigh-on skipped two grades.
Schlittler’s Aggressiveness Belying His Years
Schlittler’s aforementioned outing against the Nationals was not a fluke. It was his eighth start with the Yankees, and his second scoreless outing in a row. So far in the month of August, Schlittler has pitched 27.2 innings and given up only five runs, striking out 31.
Houston Astros excepted, the opposition Schlittler has faced during that stretch has not been the toughest. Yet he has been legitimately excellent nonetheless. Indeed, in his previous start against the Tampa Bay Rays, Schlittler was on course for a perfect game through the first six innings.
Despite the lack of the usual high-minor seasoning one would expect of a pitching prospect, Schlittler has arrived with the Yankees ready to work. The fastball already hits three digits and according to Baseball Savant averages 97 miles per hour, and although Schlittler only really uses his curveball against right-handed hitters, the deception in the arm angle means they are not hitting it.
Moreover, all of Schlittler’s pitches are thrown with decent location control, and he has shown the confidence to deliver them all in any count. With the sharp curve and the high fastball in particular serving as put-away pitches, Schlittler has already made adjustments to his pitch mix in order to improve, adding greater deception to his easy delivery and quality stuff.
Possible Postseason Starting Spot
Because of all of the above, Schlittler is in the running for a spot in the Yankees‘ post-season rotation, barely one year out of A-ball.
Gerrit Cole is out for the season, and Clarke Schmidt might be out for the next two. As things stand, the Yankees are currently running with a rotation of Carlos Rodon, Max Fried, Will Warren, Luis Gil, and Schlittler.
Rotations, of course, tend to shorten during the MLB postseason, and if only through seniority alone, conventional thinking would hold that the 24-year-old Schlittler would be the one to lose out in a four-man rotation. If the Yankees make the wild card – as currently seems likely, given that the Toronto Blue Jays are running away with the division – they will have a three-game series to play in order to make the full postseason.
Rodon and Fried in some order, will surely fill two of the spots. But with his performances across his first eight starts, Schlittler is making a very strong case for the third spot. Schlittler was supposed to be the future, but the future is already here – and it is as good as advertised.
“He’s giving them a chance every time he gets out there…” – @AlexAvilaMLB
The Meteoric Rise of Yankee’s Cam Schlittler