Cam Schlittler won the American League Cy Young Award yesterday, taking all 30 first-place votes ahead of Toronto ace Dylan Cease and Cleveland rookie Parker Messick. The full story of the vote and the seasons behind it is in our original breaking report.
By Thursday morning the award had a second day to it: Schlittler’s own reaction from home in Massachusetts, a statement from his manager, the complete ballot breakdown, and a second honour in Las Vegas that put both Schlittler and Cease on the same All-MLB First Team.
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Schlittler Reacts: Family First, Then The Championship
Schlittler was home in Walpole, Massachusetts, with his parents, John and Christine, beside him when Roger Clemens announced his name on MLB Network. “I’m just happy to make all my starts. I was able to stay healthy and be consistent throughout the season,” he said in a conference call reported firsthand by Yardbarker. “It’s good to get to this moment and enjoy it with my family. It’s a special night for everyone. It’s a special moment being a Yankee to have Roger present that award. I had a few conversations with Roger. I would like to have more in the future.” His own post on X was shorter than any of it:
“Unanimous” – Cam Schlittler (@Cam31Schlittler) on X, November 12, 2026
His captain kept it almost as short. “Congrats brother!! Unanimous,” Aaron Judge posted, in the reaction roundup at FirstSportz. Manager Aaron Boone’s statement, released by the Yankees, ran longer: “Cam had as dominant a season as a starting pitcher can have from start to finish. He’s shown an astonishing amount of growth since we drafted him, and his success is no accident. This Cy Young is richly deserved. Cam was the most dominant pitcher in our league and continues to grow into a foundational player for this franchise.” The Yankees’ own film of the season, posted by the club under the line “His year. His terms. His Cy Young,” is here:
The club’s video notes a split no ballot needed: Schlittler led major league pitchers on the road in ERA (1.16), strikeouts (129), opponents’ batting average (.153) and WHIP (0.74). Even so, he spent his reaction looking for the gaps. “I could have had a better season,” he said. “I didn’t like the way it finished. Things definitely could have been better.” Asked about next year, he told MLB Network: “I think I’m in a really good spot to handle the workload again next year. We obviously didn’t meet the end goal, and the end goal is to win a championship and that’s where my eyes are.”
The Full Cam Schlittler Cy Young Ballot, Settled
The BBWAA’s published ballot breakdown puts the margin in hard numbers: Schlittler 210 points, Cease 110, Messick 84 and Tampa Bay’s Drew Rasmussen 72, with Schlittler, Cease, Messick and Rasmussen the only pitchers named on all 30 ballots. The association records this as the 14th unanimous American League choice and the third by a Yankee, after Ron Guidry in 1978 and Gerrit Cole in 2023. Both Toronto chapter voters, MLB.com’s Keegan Matheson and Sportsnet’s Arden Zwelling, filed the same top three: Schlittler, Cease, Messick. Overnight reporting added two lines to Schlittler’s place in franchise history: at 25 he is the youngest Yankee ever to win the award, and the club’s first homegrown starter to win it since Guidry in 1978. MLB Network’s own breakdown of the two unanimous winners is here:
Cease Lands All-MLB First Team Hours Later
Cease did not leave Wednesday empty-handed. Later that night at the MLB Awards in Las Vegas, both Cease and Schlittler were named starting pitchers on the 2026 All-MLB First Team, alongside Jacob Misiorowski, Chris Sale and Cristopher Sanchez. It is Cease’s third All-MLB selection, and Toronto reliever Louis Varland joined him on the First Team after winning the inaugural BBWAA American League Reliever of the Year award earlier in the day.
The runner-up finish also settled the argument that followed Cease to Toronto. In February, an anonymous survey of executives by The Athletic’s Jayson Stark picked Cease’s signing as the worst of the offseason, with 13 votes. Jays Journal’s morning-after verdict is that year one answered it: his 239 strikeouts are the fourth most in Blue Jays history, behind only Roger Clemens, twice, and Robbie Ray, both Cy Young winners in Toronto. The same account dates the turn in his season to July 25 in Boston, where he first felt the shoulder discomfort that put him on the injured list on September 23, which is also where the Cy Young gap opened: Schlittler threw 24 and two thirds more innings and finished at full strength.
What The Award Sets Up Next
For Schlittler, the trophy changes his winter. He earned $801,425 in 2026 and, barring an extension, has one pre-arbitration season left, which puts his next contract on the Yankees’ offseason agenda. For Cease, the next step is year two in Toronto as the centre of the rotation, with six seasons left on his deal and a second career runner-up finish behind him. Awards week itself closes tonight, Thursday, November 12, when the BBWAA announces the Most Valuable Player winners. The Cy Young story, though, ended the way Schlittler framed it himself: a family night in Walpole, one word on X, and a pitcher already talking about the championship his season did not win.
