NEW YORK — Cam Schlittler knew he needed to pace himself, so instead of jogging to the mound to start each inning, he decided to walk. It was the only deviation from his routine on the best night of his career, and it allowed him to soak in the best sound of his career: the standing ovation the sellout crowd of 48,833 gave him as he headed out to begin the eighth inning.
“I wasn’t expecting that,” he said, after it was over and he’d bested his childhood favorite team, the Red Sox, 4–0, in Game 3 of the American League wild card series to send New York to the AL division series. “That was a great feeling. It gave me a bit more confidence to go out there and do my job.”
That’s one way of describing his night. Here is another: “He was crisp as f—, man,” said injured ace Gerrit Cole. “And he was, like, dialed.”
Schlittler, 24 and not quite three months removed from his major league debut, authored the kind of masterpiece the Yankees will need if they are to finish what they started last season and win the World Series: 107 pitches, eight innings, no runs, no walks, 12 strikeouts. He allowed manager Aaron Boone to bypass most of his shaky relief corps and go straight to closer David Bednar. And Schlittler gave an inconsistent offense cover as it struggled early against Red Sox lefty Connelly Early, and eventually scored mostly on Boston defensive miscues. It was only the second playoff game they won without hitting a home run since 2011.
The victory gave the Yankees their first postseason series win over the Red Sox since 2003 and made them the first team since the new playoff format debuted in ’22 to lose Game 1 of the wild card series and still move on.
Yankees manager Aaron Boone understated it as: “When you throw 100 [mph] and command the baseball and can land your secondary pitches, you can be a problem for the opposition.”
Only six other pitchers have thrown eight scoreless, walkless innings in an elimination game. None were making their 15th major league appearance. No one else has ever done all that while striking out 12. The Red Sox only saw a three-ball count once, in the second inning. They only put a man on second base once, in the fifth.
“We needed to be perfect tonight, because he was perfect,” said Red Sox manager Alex Cora. “The stuff is outstanding. He was under control. That was electric. That was electric.”
Through the first four innings, only DH Masataka Yoshida reached base, singling twice. Schlittler pitched around a pair of singles in the fifth, then one more in the sixth. He was at 89 pitches, but when he returned to the dugout, Boone did not shake his hand, his usual signal that a pitcher is done. The manager simply said, “You feel good?” Schlittler nodded.
He went back out for the seventh, only the third time he’s been allowed to see that inning since the Yankees took him in the seventh round of the 2022 draft. That took all of 11 pitches. Boone turned to pitching coach Matt Blake. “He’s going back out,” the skipper said. “Sounds good to me,” said Blake.
“His ability to throw easy gas makes it an easier decision there,” said Cole. “Because you know, how many times has he really stepped on it? Even the 100s and the 101s early are not effort, they’re adrenaline. He’s taking advantage of the atmosphere. So when he’s gotta ratchet it up when he’s kind of feeling like it’s coming towards the end, he’s got it in the tank. He’s absolutely got it.”
As the crowd roared, Schlittler strode back to the mound, where he struck out the first hitter he faced, then induced a foul pop-up that finally got his defense involved: Third baseman Ryan McMahon sprinted 75 feet and somersaulted into the Red Sox’ dugout to snag the ball. (“I thought he was dead,” catcher Austin Wells said later.) The next pitch was a 98-mph sinker, which Trevor Story grounded to shortstop. Schlittler walked off the mound as if heading to a dentist’s appointment.
It was in part that attitude that gave the Yankees such confidence in him despite his inexperience. Boone first noticed him in spring training, when he came up from minor league camp and seemed completely at ease with the big club. Blake watched him talk calmly and confidently this week about how he would dismantle the Red Sox and believed him. Schlittler tried to manufacture a chip on his shoulder facing his childhood team, but mostly he just didn’t want to let his teammates down. He said he slept easily the night before the start.
He has always possessed this level of composure, his parents, Christine and John, said. Cam grew up in Walpole, Mass., about half an hour southwest of Fenway Park, obsessed with Clay Buchholz and then Chris Sale. Cam was three when John took him to the 2004 World Series parade and 12 when he watched them win it all in ’13. Schlittler went to Northeastern and as a freshman, he threw a scoreless first inning against the Red Sox in the 2020 iteration of their annual spring training game. He got Jarren Duran out then, too. (“Obviously I am a lot different player than I was then,” Schlittler said.) Schlittler tripped up briefly with pronouns on Thursday when discussing Red Sox fans.
“We’re aggressive, and we try to get under people’s skin,” he said, drenched in champagne, the Yankees’ player of the game championship belt draped over his left shoulder. He was referencing some friendly smack talk from his friends and some less friendly commentary from strangers. “They just picked the wrong guy to do it to—and the wrong team to do it to.”
A date with the Blue Jays awaits. This was all still so new to the Schlittlers, they hadn’t even booked their travel to Toronto. “We’re superstitious,” explained Christine. “We don’t look ahead.”
They’ll learn. Around the same time, Boone walked out onto the field to discover he’d missed the celebratory series-winning team photo.
He shrugged. “That’s all right,” he said. “I’ll catch the next one.”
