NEW YORK — The last time Cam Schlittler pitched at Yankee Stadium, the city was watching with everything on the line. He delivered in a win-or-go-home wild-card game against the Boston Red Sox, throwing eight shutout innings with 12 strikeouts against the team from his hometown. The Yankee Stadium crowd gave him a standing ovation. He was 24 years old and pitching like the future had already arrived.
That was last October. Now the future is the present, and Schlittler is back home for his first regular-season start in the Bronx in 2026, set to face the Oakland Athletics on Tuesday night. The buzz around him is louder than ever. So is the expectation.
A historic start sets the stage
Cam Schlittler has done nothing to quiet the noise since Opening Day. Through his first two starts of the 2026 season, the 25-year-old right-hander has been, statistically, one of the most dominant young arms in recent Yankees history.
He opened in San Francisco against the Giants on March 27, working 5.1 scoreless innings on just 68 pitches. He allowed one hit, struck out eight, and walked nobody. Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton hit home runs in the sixth to seal a 3-0 Yankees win. Four days later in Seattle, Schlittler was even sharper. He held the reigning AL West champion Mariners to two hits over 6.1 innings, striking out seven and again issuing zero walks in a 5-3 Yankees victory.
The combined line: 11.2 scoreless innings, 15 strikeouts, zero walks, and zero runs allowed across 38 batters faced. That made Schlittler the first pitcher in Yankees franchise history to open a season with back-to-back starts of at least five scoreless innings and seven strikeouts, per the New York Post.
He is also the first Yankee ever to begin a season by allowing no runs and no walks while recording at least 15 strikeouts across any two-start span.
The stuff behind the numbers
The performance is not happening by accident. Schlittler’s arsenal has taken a step forward from what Yankees fans saw in the second half of 2025. His four-seam fastball, which averaged around 97 mph last fall, is being thrown with even more intent this spring. His average pitch velocity entering Tuesday sat at 95.1 mph across all pitch types, which ranked second among all MLB starters with at least 100 pitches thrown, trailing only Milwaukee’s Jacob Misiorowski at 95.9 mph.
The key addition is a cutter. Schlittler has been throwing it harder than in previous versions and with sharper late movement, giving him a third distinct fastball type to pair with his upper-90s four-seamer and two-seamer. The result is an arsenal that hitters have to process on multiple planes, and the early returns show they have not solved it yet.
Manager Aaron Boone has been watching closely and is not hiding his enthusiasm.
“His calling card since he got in the organization was his ability to throw strikes with his fastball, especially,” Boone said. “And now, as he’s gone to another level from a stuff standpoint, that’s really served him well.”
Boone called the overall performance eye-opening even by the standards of a staff that has already been historically efficient.
“It’s exciting to see how dominant his stuff is, just filling up the strike zone,” Boone said. “He got some early outs and that allowed him to get pretty deep into the game with a pitch count. He’s throwing the ball incredibly well. He set the tone for us.”
Schlittler keeps pitch counts low with precision
One of the quieter storylines in Schlittler’s start has been efficiency. He was slightly behind schedule heading into the season after dealing with a minor back issue during spring training. The Yankees eased him into a full workload, keeping him at 68 and then 79 pitches across his first two outings.
Despite those tight limits, he logged enough innings in both starts to qualify for wins. He did it by attacking the zone relentlessly. When a pitcher is not walking anyone and getting weak contact early in counts, he does not need 100 pitches to put up quality numbers. That is exactly the version of Schlittler the Yankees have seen.
“Just attack the zone and do what I can to get as far as I can with limited pitches,” Schlittler said after his Seattle start.
He was introduced before the Yankees’ home opener earlier in the week to a loud ovation from the Stadium crowd. Tuesday night will be his first chance to actually pitch in front of them in 2026. The reception is expected to be even louder.
The Yankees rotation entered the Oakland series leading the majors in ERA and second in WHIP. Schlittler, Max Fried, Will Warren and Ryan Weathers combined for a 1.81 ERA through nine games. That four-man unit produced five wins. Those figures would not be possible without Schlittler at the top of the rotation acting as the tone-setter.
Oakland arrives with new life after a rough start
Schlittler’s first Bronx test comes against an Athletics club that has been inconsistent but showed real teeth in its most recent outing. Oakland opened 0-4 and was swept by the Toronto Blue Jays to begin the season. But the A’s have since won three of five and erupted for a wild 12-10 walk-off win over the Houston Astros on Sunday, a game that ended on a three-run home run by Brent Rooker.
Rooker had entered Sunday in a deep slump, going 4-for-30 with 14 strikeouts to start the year before connecting twice Sunday. First baseman Nick Kurtz, also cold early at 2-for-24, produced his first multi-hit game in the same outing. The combination of power and contact from the middle of Oakland’s order is a warning sign for a Yankees staff that has looked untouchable but has not yet faced a team this hungry for a run.
Aaron Civale starts opposite Schlittler for the A’s. The veteran right-hander is 1-5 with a 6.35 ERA in seven career regular-season starts against the Yankees and surrendered three home runs and five runs in just three innings when he faced New York last March for Milwaukee. His recent form has been sharper but his history against the Yankees lineup gives New York a decided edge on paper.
The Yankees enter the Oakland series at 7-2, tied with the Los Angeles Dodgers and Milwaukee Brewers for the best record in baseball. Schlittler, now pitching with a streak and a Bronx crowd behind him, has every reason to keep adding to the Yankees’ win total.
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