Cam Schlittler took the mound for the Somerset Patriots, the New York Yankees‘ Double-A affiliate, making his fourth start of the 2025 season. He was coming off a rocky performance in Altoona, where he allowed six runs, five unearned, and failed to complete the fifth inning. Pitching at home in TD Bank Ballpark against the Hartford YardGoats, Schlittler tossed a gem in front of the Somerset faithful, flashing an excellent four-pitch mix that featured a fastball that topped out at 98 MPH on the stadium gun.
Yankees’ pitching coach Matt Blake told Gary Phillips of the Daily News earlier in the week that Cam Schlittler is someone who could get a big-league promotion in the second half of the season. He still needs time to develop, but if he continues performing the way he did last night, the Yankees might have an internal solution to their rotation questions.
Dominant Start By Cam Schlittler Brings Him a Step Closer to Yankees’ Promotion
The Yankees have a lack of pitching prospects in the upper levels of the Minor Leagues, and it’s reflected in a Triple-A rotation that relies more on veterans on Minor League deals than it does on homegrown talent. Trades and injuries have eaten into their Minor League depth, but Cam Schlittler is one of their rising solutions to that problem. He put together a brilliant outing last night, firing seven shutout innings where he allowed two hits and one walk, striking out nine Hartford hitters.
He was able to go to that hammer curveball often in two-strike counts, as hitters would swing over that pitch repeatedly throughout the night. Sitting between 81-83 MPH, this curveball has good vertical depth and plays well off of his four-seam fastball, which went from a set-up pitch to a strikeout one as the outing went on. Instead of going to the sweeper or curveball third time through the order when he got to two strikes, Schlittler was able to execute fastballs on the black to get called strike threes, freezing hitters who seemed geared up for an offspeed pitch.
Cam Schlittler’s four-seamer was sizzling at 95 MPH, topping out at 98 MPH while hitting 97 MPH on the stadium gun multiple times throughout the outing. His command of it was sublime; he kept his heater up for whiffs and could locate it on the corners for called strikes or weak contact when he needed it, setting the tone by consistently throwing strikes and getting ahead of hitters. His sweeper and cutter play important roles in his arsenal as well, as his sweeping slider has tons of lateral movement in the 83-86 MPH range while the cutter has tighter spin and sits between 88-90 MPH.
It’s a strong four-pitch mix, and the numbers at Double-A are starting to come around for Cam Schlittler, who could be on his way to Scranton sooner rather than later.
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With a 3.15 ERA and 3.03 FIP, Cam Schlittler has strong results across 11 outings with the Somerset Patriots, but results-oriented scouting often leaves out important context. Teams care about Key Performance Indicators, traits such as a pitcher’s pitch quality, strike-throwing abilities, and K-BB% can better inform a team about a pitcher’s process, removing external variables that have nothing to do with a pitcher’s performance. Schlittler checks the pitch quality box; his four-seamer has the velocity and shape, while his breaking balls are swing-and-miss machines.
He’s landed over 65% of his pitches for strikes with the Somerset Patriots and has a 21.3% K-BB%, both of which are excellent marks as well. The Yankees will keep Cam Schlittler in Double-A for at least a few more weeks, I’d imagine, but that promotion to Triple-A doesn’t seem that far away. It’s important to note that the run environment at the Triple-A level is insane, and there could be some issues adapting to that baseball as well. Those baseballs are a one-for-one copy of the MLB balls, which don’t move as much as the ones used in Double-A.
The Yankees might have already had Schlittler throwing an MLB ball in some of his Double-A starts before promoting him to Scranton, which they did with Richard Fitts a few years back. Both pitchers had cut-ride fastballs, which are more immune to the reduction in IVB than pitchers that generate higher spin efficiencies on their heaters. I’m excited to see how Cam Schlittler develops, but he’s already off to an incredible start in 2025. He sits with a 1.23 ERA and 29.3% K% through four outings in Somerset, and he could be an option for the Yankees’ rotation by season’s end.