Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across Major League Baseball. Throughout the year we ask questions of the most plugged-in Yankees fans and fans across the country. Sign up here to participate in the weekly emailed surveys.
Going into 2026, the Yankees have quite a number of interesting rotation options at their disposal. Some of those — the likes of Gerrit Cole, Carlos Rodón, and Clarke Schmidt — will miss some time to start the season, but are expected back at some point. In the meantime,
the team will be relying on Max Fried at the top of the rotation, and hoping that Cam Schlittler is as good as his tantalizing rookie season made him look.
There are also another couple young players who, at least to start the year, will be tasked with rounding out the rotation. Two of them we’ve seen plenty of in recent years: Will Warren and 2024 AL Rookie of the Year Luis Gil. Another is Ryan Weathers, who the Yankees picked up in a trade with the Marlins this offseason. With those three hoping to impress and get a longer run in the rotation, even when the Yankees start to get some guys back from injury, we wanted to know which of them you think will have the best 2026.
As you can see, Warren was the runaway winner in the voting. That’s understandable, as we have seen several flashes of being a good pitcher in his time in the majors. With a career 5.16 ERA and a 4.44 one last year — 92 ERA+, for reference — he hasn’t been able to find consistency at the big league level. However even when he has struggled, signs like his strikeout numbers point to there being something there.
Of the three, Gil has probably shown the most at the big league level, having won the AL ROTY, as mentioned. While he dealt with injuries of his own last season, keeping him out a while, he didn’t totally replicate that in 2025. His ERA was actually better than 2024, but some of his peripherals were worse, as he continued to struggle with control and walking batters. He’s also a bit older than a ROTY win might suggest, as he’ll be 28 in June.
Weathers is quite low on this post, probably because he has really struggled in spring training. Of course, you can’t always just copy and paste spring numbers into the regular season, as players use this time of year to work on stuff, trying things they might not in a regular season game. However, there’s only so much you can write off from a 8.68 ERA in 9.1 innings. His spring debut was very impressive, and he’s struck out a ton of batters, but it’s easy to understand why people are skeptical at this stage, when we’ve mostly only seen him struggle in a Yankees’ uniform.
Whether you voted in the poll or not, who of those three do you think will have the best 2026 and why?
These survey results are sponsored by FanDuel.
