Cy Young Award 2026: Schlittler and Misiorowski Win Unanimously — the Youngest Pair in 41 Years
Baseball's pitching future arrived with a unanimous vote on Wednesday night. The Yankees' Cam Schlittler, 25, and the Brewers' Jacob Misiorowski, 24, swept all 30 first-place votes in their leagues — the youngest Cy Young pair since Dwight Gooden and Bret Saberhagen in 1985, and just the third unanimous pair in the same year in award history.
NEW YORK — The Cy Young Awards took a youthful turn that had not been seen in 41 years. Jacob Misiorowski, 24, of the Milwaukee Brewers and Cam Schlittler, 25, of the New York Yankees won the National and American League Cy Young Awards, respectively, in balloting announced Wednesday, November 11 — and both were unanimous, taking all 30 first-place votes and 210 points apiece from the Baseball Writers' Association of America.
The numbers behind the sweeps are stark. Misiorowski finished 16-5 with a 1.80 ERA and 252 strikeouts, leading the major leagues in seven statistical categories, USA TODAY reported, and threw 28 of the 35 hardest pitches in baseball this season — between 104 and 105.5 mph. Schlittler went 14-6, won the AL ERA title at 1.95, struck out 239 and pitched 193 2/3 innings in his first full season, four years after the Yankees drafted him in the seventh round out of Northeastern, where his fastball barely hit 88 mph. In the AL voting, Toronto's Dylan Cease was second (110 points) and Cleveland rookie Parker Messick third (84); in the NL, Philadelphia's Cristopher Sanchez (99) edged Atlanta's Chris Sale (98) for second.
Together, they are the youngest Cy Young-winning duo since 1985, when 20-year-old Dwight Gooden and 21-year-old Bret Saberhagen took the honors, and just the third pair of unanimous winners in the same year since the award split by league in 1967 — joining Denny McLain and Bob Gibson in 1968 and Justin Verlander and Sandy Alcantara in 2022. 'The game's changing. And it's going in the right direction,' Schlittler told USA TODAY Sports on the winners' conference call. 'I was just happy to make all my starts and stay healthy all year.' Misiorowski, who debuted in June 2025, called his rise 'crazy... It's been a crazy year and a half. But it's been fun.'
Wednesday's announcement also named the Relievers of the Year — Toronto's Louis Varland in the AL and San Diego's Mason Miller in the NL — and set up the last act of awards week: the AL and NL Most Valuable Player winners will be announced Thursday. For Rangers fans watching from Arlington, the AL result is the standard the division's young arms will be measured against in 2027: a 25-year-old who was a seventh-round pick four years ago just ran the table.
