Carlos Rodón has had issues with command, and even when he’s rolling, he would always surrender that crooked number that would ruin his outing – but not this season.
After Rodón’s miraculous outing on Monday night against one of the better teams in MLB, the San Diego Padres, he lowered his ERA to 2.96 and rose to the top of the American League leaderboard in strikeouts with 57. Opponents are also only hitting .152 off of Rodón, which is the lowest in baseball.
“Definitely a strong lineup – some great hitters in that lineup,” Rodón said when asked about how he was able to shut down a solid Padres lineup. “Wells was great tonight, featured a lot of changeups. Just tried to get ahead and let the defense make the plays. They did well.”
The southpaw has found a ton of barrels over the course of his career, but this season, it seems like he has made an adjustment. In 2023 and 2024, he was in the first and fourth percentiles in terms of barrel percentage. In 2025, he’s in the 75th percentile (h/t Baseball Savant).
Outside of Max Fried, who is performing like the best pitcher in baseball one month into the season, the Yankees haven’t had a consistent arm in their rotation. After Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil went down, New York was left with questions it didn’t have the answers to.
Clarke Schmidt also missed the first few weeks with an injury, which hurt the Yankees even more, but they’re still in first place in the American League East.
The Yankees tried striking gold yet again with a young pitcher in Will Warren, just like they did a season ago with Gil, who won the AL Rookie of the Year. Warren walks too many batters, and his ERA is sitting at 5.65, while his WHIP sits at 1.53. He’s walked 15 batters in 28.2 innings.
Carlos Carrasco was a fun spring training story that made the team due to the injuries, but he was DFAd on Tuesday. The gamble on Marcus Stroman exploded in the team’s face just weeks after trying to trade him, and then he landed on the injured list.
In addition to the low ERA and high strikeout number, Rodón has a 0.92 WHIP. The 32-year-old has stayed healthy, giving the Yankees 48.2 innings, which is the third most in the majors. He’s also had a 0.70 ERA over his last four starts and has cut back on the walks.
“Just getting in the zone and attacking with the fastball, better places with the fastball,” Rodón said. “And just kind of pitching to contact, let the defense do the work. Our defense is so good – let them catch the balls and get the outs.”
