TAMPA — Cam Schlittler pitched to minor leaguers at a mostly empty and silent Steinbrenner Field on Monday morning.
Two starts from now, he could be throwing against the Giants at a packed and loud Oracle Park in the second game of the season.
On the final “off-day” of Yankees spring training Monday, Schlittler got his work in by building up to 54 pitches across four innings of live batting practice against minor leaguers, keeping him on track to potentially follow Max Fried in the rotation to begin the year.
“Whatever they want me to do, whether I throw that series or not, I’m prepared to do that,” Schlittler said after pitching in front of a handful of Yankees personnel, including Hal Steinbrenner.
The hard-throwing right-hander, whose camp ramp-up was slightly delayed by mid-back inflammation, should be in line to throw around 65-70 pitches in his regular-season debut, as long as his spring finale (likely on Saturday) goes according to plan.
There should be much more adrenaline readily available for Schlittler’s first start of the season than there was on Monday morning, though he was encouraged by how he threw.
“Felt good, felt in control, didn’t have a walk, so that’s a really good feeling,” Schlittler said.
The 25-year-old was pitching the morning after staying up to watch Team USA knock off the Dominican Republic in a thrilling WBC semifinal, which included teammates Aaron Judge, David Bednar, Austin Wells and Camilo Doval.
There were “some conversations” over the offseason about Schlittler potentially joining USA’s roster, he said, but they did not go too far because it was “already kind of decided” he would not participate given that he was coming off a career-high workload last season.
That said, Schlittler indicated he would be interested in pitching in the event the next time around.
“For sure,” he said. “Just wasn’t an option this year with the workload I threw last year. So hopefully I get another opportunity to do that in a couple years.”
Will Warren is scheduled to make his penultimate start of the spring Tuesday afternoon against the Rays, which could line him up to start the third game of the regular season.
The right-hander has had one of the strongest springs of any Yankee, pitching to a 1.65 ERA across four starts and 16 ¹/₃ innings.
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