As the month of August was coming to a close, the Yankees added two veteran right-handed pitchers to help them survive the season’s final push: Michael Fulmer and John Schreiber. While we all can hope that Ryan Weathers, Clarke Schmidt, and Fernando Cruz can return, be effective, and give the ‘pen some much-needed depth before the October lights start to shine, I thought it would be a good time to examine what these two journeymen bring to the table.
Fulmer was once a trade rumor darling that Yankees
fans heard plenty about. It might have taken years and a lot of lost shine, but as always, Brian Cashman eventually got his man. Fulmer began this season on a minor league contract with the San Francisco Giants after spending the 2025 season bouncing between three organizations while trying to return to form. The veteran missed all of the 2024 season after having UCL revision surgery, essentially Tommy John light, in October of 2023.
In 2026, Fulmer pitched well in Triple-A Sacramento for the Giants, posting a 2.98 ERA with 10 saves over 37 appearances. The team never gave him a call-up despite their struggles and released him in early August. Fulmer then signed with the Angels and tossed 3.2 scoreless innings across three relief appearances while striking out four. The Angels DFA’d Fulmer after getting a few players off the injured list, and he signed with the Yankees on August 26th. The Yankees are his seventh organization in the last two years alone.
The former Rookie of the Year is now working primarily with a cutter that sits at 89 mph. Fulmer attacks righties with a sweeper that comes in at 81-84 mph, tunnels well with his cutter, and has an elite spin rate exceeding 2,800 RPM. You might remember this pitch, as it was the one he used to freeze Yordan Alvarez for his very first strikeout in a Yankee uniform.
Righties have not been an issue for Fulmer, as they have an .501 OPS before play on Wednesday, but lefties have gotten the better of him, posting a 1.012 OPS. Most of that damage by lefties was the result of his four-seamer getting crushed. When going after lefties, Fulmer has used the cutter and is now using his changeup.
Never before a staple in his arsenal, Fulmer’s changeup is now averaging 14.9 inches of horizontal tailing action alongside 10.2 inches of vertical drop. It effectively falls off the table away from lefties. Fulmer’s changeup has an xBA of .074, and it appears to be a developing weapon for the veteran. With the Yankees, Fulmer has tossed 5.1 innings, giving up two earned runs while striking out six with a WHIP of 1.50.
Fulmer’s days of fireballing four-seam fastballs are over. However, this would not be the first time the Yankees picked up a player with an elite pitch metric and then allowed Matt Blake to craft sequences and tinker with usage rates to find success. After the journey he has had, it is easy to cheer for the guy.
Schreiber had a less dramatic pathway to pinstripes. After making 55 appearances for the Royals, the team decided to cut the veteran, free agent to be, in a mix of a cost-savings and see-what-we-got-elsewhere move by Kansas City. Schreiber is a nightmare for right-handed hitters due to a low or even, nine-degree arm angle. This true sidearm release point creates an incredibly unique visual approach and is like watching an old wooden rollercoaster whip around a corner.
In a much larger sample size against MLB hitters, Schreiber has faced 107 lefties and righties before play on Wednesday. Lefties have posted a .992 OPS, while righties have a .405 OPS. None of his pitches have elite profiles, and his underlying metrics are mostly what the kids would call, booty. However, he has gotten decent results, and though they might not be pretty or stuffing the cool new stats, he has a 3.42 ERA in 52.2 innings worked.
One super cool thing to note: Schreiber’s sinker moves 15 inches to the right, while his sweeper moves 15 inches to the left. These pitches look identical for the first 25 to 30 feet until they take off in one direction or the other. Schreiber’s best pitch this season has been his four-seamer, which has an xBA of .185. This pitch and its tunnel/movement compared to his sinker he also throws creates the illusion that the ball is “riding” over a hitter’s hands.
Since getting out of the Kansas City last-place heat, Schreiber has appeared in four games as a Yankee. In those three games, he has tossed 4.1 innings of hitless baseball with a WHIP of 0.46. I always like having a guy who is different coming out of the ‘pen, and I personally cannot imagine going from facing one of the Yankees’ big four starters to this guy in the same evening.
Here is to hoping these veteran journeymen can help the bullpen navigate the end of the season. They might not be the high-powered, high-strikeout arms many crave out of the ‘pen, but if they can get outs and pass the ball off cleanly, they’ll get the job done nicely.
