The Yankees, after winning the first two games of their season opener against the San Francisco Giants, will go for the three-game sweep tonight at 7:15 PM ET on Saturday Night Baseball.
The Yankees, who won yesterday, are coming off a strong season debut from young Yankees right-hander Cam Schlittler, who made his major league debut last season. Schlittler threw five shutout innings with eight strikeouts, and the Yankees team as a whole has shut down the Giants twice in the first two games so far, with the pitching staff going eighteen scoreless innings, and the offense scoring 10 runs combined in the first two games.
Yankees Pitching Has Shut Down The Giants Lineup So Far
What’s notable about the first two games is that this is the “first occurrence” the Yankees have had “back-to-back shutout wins to start a season”, according to MLB researcher Sarah Langs. On the opposite side of the scorecard, except not in a good way, Chris Kirschner of The Athletic states how the Giants have been the “first team to get shut out in consecutive back-to-back in the first two games opening a season”, according to Kirschner.
Kirschner also mentions how the Yankees’ first two starting pitchers to begin the season, Max Fried and Cam Schlittler, are the first pair of Yankees starters to toss scoreless outings for the first time since “Roger Clemens and Andy Pettitte in 2003”, states Kirschner.
The Yankees will now try to complete the sweep this Saturday night as they hand the ball to another promising young starting pitcher, 26-year-old right-hander Will Warren. Warren had a decent season in 2025, but will be looking for more consistency in 2026 after posting a 9-8 record with a 4.44 ERA, 1.37 WHIP, and 171 strikeouts in 162.1 innings pitched last season.
Warren Made Significant Progress In 2025
Warren had multiple shutout starts last year, where he was dominant against good offensive teams such as the A’s and Mariners, but at times struggled against teams like the Red Sox and Blue Jays. Warren is a pitcher who heavily relies on movement to generate swing-and-miss. He throws five different pitches (fastball, sinker, sweeper, change-up) and can use those pitches, working up, down, in, and out to change eye levels, speeds, and disrupt the timing of the hitter, according to his Baseball Savant page.
While Warren throws just a low to mid-90s fastball that only averages 93 mph, he gets great run and spin on it with a 17 fastball run value, placing him in the 94th percentile amongst starting pitchers last season, according to Baseball Savant.Warren was a key contributor to the 2025 Yankees, also because he covered a lot of needed innings. The Yankees lost Gerrit Cole before the start of the season due to needing Tommy John Surgery. They then lost Clarke Schmidt in July, and Luis Gil missed the first four months of the 2025 season due to a lat strain injury sustained during Spring Training.
Yankees Relied Significantly On Warren In 2025
The Yankees needed someone to cover innings, and Will Warren did just that, providing them some insurance, strong stretches of appearances, and something to build upon after his major league debut in 2024, when he really struggled in his brief six outings.
Warren will go up against Giants right-hander Tyler Mahle, who posted an impressive 6-4 record with a 2.18 ERA, 66 strikeouts, and a 1.13 WHIP in 86.2 innings pitched in 2025 with the Texas Rangers. Mahle re-established himself as a starting pitcher, good enough to land a one-year, $10 million contract from the Giants this past offseason.
The one thing both Warren and Mahle will have an edge over the hitters in this game is the environment. Oracle Park is notorious for being a pitcher’s ballpark, with deep dimensions in left and right-center field. While the Yankees will look to continue their hot start to the season and complete the sweep, the Giants will, on the other hand, look to break out of this two-game slump on offense as they look for their first win of the season.
Yankees’ Going For Giants Sweep With Will Warren Pitching