The 2025 season hasn’t even ended yet, and the Yankees already know that three of their starting pitchers won’t begin the 2026 campaign on time.
Carlos Rodón joined the injured group last week when he underwent a procedure to remove loose bodies and shave down a bone spur in his left elbow. Aaron Boone said the surgery came with an eight-week pause on throwing. Brian Cashman added that Rodón is expected back in April or early May, barring any setbacks.
The general manager, speaking at the Yankees’ postmortem press conference, also said that he wasn’t sure if Rodón’s injury will prompt him to explore the starting pitching market this offseason.
“I don’t know what that means to where we put our remaining resources in and how we reinforce,” said Cashman, whose biggest questions are in the outfield and bullpen. “Do we have enough from within? Do we have to go outside to augment? You never can have enough pitching. The good thing is [Rodón’s] coming back, so I have to make sure there’s room on the roster when he does.”
That last sentence could be a hint that the Yankees won’t target a top-shelf starter just for the sake of filling Rodón’s absence. That would be a huge gamble for a team trying to win its first title since 2009.
Consider that Rodón, Gerrit Cole and Clarke Schmidt will all be coming off operations – the latter two are recovering from Tommy John surgery – and won’t be available on Opening Day. While a more evolved pitcher now, Rodón was terrible in 2023 as injuries delayed and interrupted his first season in pinstripes. There is no guarantee that Cole, 35, will be his Cy Young self once he’s back, hopefully sometime soon after the season begins. Schmidt won’t be an option until the second half and has now had his ulnar collateral ligament reconstructed twice.
There’s also Luis Gil, who had his 2025 season delayed until August thanks to a spring training lat injury. He looked nothing like the pitcher who won the Rookie of the Year Award in 2024, as he lacked strikeout stuff while trying to limit his velocity in an effort to rein in his command problems.
As for the Yankees’ other healthy starters, Max Fried and 2025 rookies Cam Schlittler and Will Warren are all coming off career-high workloads. The Yankees should be wondering if all three can stay healthy again and erring on the side of caution as the league looks to adjust to Schlittler after his stellar introduction to the majors.
The Yankees do have a pair of top-100 pitching prospects in Elmer Rodriguez-Cruz and Carlos Lagrange. They could get a chance to battle for Rodón’s rotation spot this spring, but they have just one start above Double-A between them after Rodriguez-Cruz’s last outing of 2025 came at Triple-A.
Chase Hampton, another highly-touted prospect, is also coming off Tommy John surgery.
Brendan Beck may be the Yankees’ most major league-ready pitching prospect, but there are questions about how his stuff will translate at the next level. The Yankees will have to add him to their 40-man roster this offseason if they don’t want to risk losing him in the Rule 5 draft.
The Yankees could certainly lean on their youth with some talented pitchers in the system, others expected back from injury, and more pressing needs on the roster. But they should also ask themselves if that is what the Dodgers, looking to repeat as champions, would do.
The answer is no.
Just last offseason, Los Angeles, fresh off kicking the Yankees’ butts in the World Series, signed Blake Snell to a $182 million contract. The rotation looked strong on paper at the time, but there were also injury concerns sprinkled in. Snell came with his own, but the Dodgers are a financial superpower, so they figured adding Snell to the group was a worthwhile luxury.
Fast forward to present day, and Snell has been the best pitcher in this postseason as he prepares to start Game 1 of the World Series.
With that in mind, the Yankees should be big-game hunting across the board this winter after getting bounced from postseason play in the ALDS. With regards to the rotation, they could do that without necessarily having to spend mega-millions right away.
While former Yankee Michael King, an injury risk, and Dylan Cease, coming off a down year, could be intriguing and expensive free agent options, among others, the trade market should offer some upgrades as well.
There’s a chance Tarik Skubal, arguably the best pitcher on the planet, will be one of them. The Yankees should be all over him if the Tigers decide to make him available, though that is not guaranteed and would come with a lofty prospect price, as well as an appetite to spend on a record-setting contract with Skubal set to hit free agency after the 2026 season.
Other potential trade targets could include Milwaukee’s Freddy Peralta and Minnesota’s Joe Ryan, two All-Star pitchers.
But with so many starters already on hand, don’t be surprised if the Yankees take a quieter, more flexible approach to their rotation.
If the Bombers were to turn to one of their aforementioned prospects, they could always option them, move them to the bullpen or trade them once their veteran starters return from rehab assignments. All three outcomes could also apply to Warren, while the latter two could apply to Gil, who is out of options.
The Yankees could also re-sign someone like Ryan Yarbrough, a career swingman who did an admirable job as a rotation fill-in this past season, or Paul Blackburn, a career starter who worked as a mop-up man down the stretch. Both pitchers would be cheap, and there will be plenty of other free agents who fit that description.
Whether the Yankees want to think bigger than that remains to be seen, though, as Cashman only discussed his team’s needs and financial flexibility in vague terms last week.
“We have got to weigh the available marketplace,” Cashman said, “via free agency or trades, with the committed payroll vs. the available payroll thereafter and measure opportunities for some players knocking on the door, earning the right to maybe take the next step from down below.”
