When the Yankees were sorting through bullpen depth back in January, Brent Headrick barely looked like the name that would matter most. The list included Jake Bird, Cade Winquest, Yerry De los Santos, Elmer Rodriguez, and Chase Hampton, and most of those arms have already come and gone.
Winquest was sent back to St. Louis in April without throwing a pitch for New York.
Bird struggled to an ERA near 6.00 before heading to the Nationals in the Luis Garcia Jr. trade. Hampton was designated for assignment last week, then claimed by Washington and optioned to Double-A Harrisburg.
De los Santos and Rodriguez are still around, but neither has locked down anything close to a full-time bullpen role. De los Santos has bounced between the majors and minors while logging 20 big league innings with a 1.35 ERA. Rodriguez has been used as a spot starter and has a 5.40 ERA across 26 2/3 innings.
Headrick, though, has turned that initial depth-reliever profile into something far more meaningful. The left-hander was drafted by the Twins in the ninth round in 2019 and did little to inspire confidence in Minnesota, posting a 5.97 ERA in fewer than 30 innings over 2023-24.
The Yankees claimed him off waivers in February 2025, and he flashed some life with a 3.13 ERA in 17 appearances. Even then, the warning signs were there: a 32.6% strikeout rate, a 7.6% walk rate, four homers allowed, and a .260 average on balls in play that hinted the run prevention might not hold.
This year, it has held - and then some. The 28-year-old entered play today with 73 1/3 innings and a 1.96 ERA, both numbers sitting in the top 10% of Major League relievers.
He added another scoreless inning behind Cam Schlittler today. Headrick is still missing bats at a strong clip, striking out close to 30% of hitters while walking just 7.9%, but the bigger story is how much better he’s been at suppressing damage when the ball is put in play.
That part matters, because this hasn’t been a case of a pitcher simply getting lucky. His BABIP has climbed from .260 last year to .324 in 2026, which is well above the league-wide .289. Even with that tougher batted-ball luck, Headrick has stayed among the best run-prevention arms in the sport.
The biggest difference has been contact quality. In 2025, hitters averaged 91.1 mph on balls in play against him, and his hard-hit rate was 42.6%.
Both were worse than league average. In 2026, those numbers have shifted in the other direction: 88.0 mph average exit velocity and a 37.0% hard-hit rate.
That’s a real change, not a fluke.
His pitch mix has evolved along with it. Headrick has cut back on his four-seam fastball by about 15% and leaned more heavily on sliders and splitters, with an occasional sinker mixed in.
That adjustment has paid off. The hard-hit rate against the four-seamer has dropped by 7%, and the pitch now carries a +8 Run Value, making it his most valuable offering even without premium velocity.
His slider has also taken a jump, gaining 2.4 mph, while opponents’ slugging percentage against it has fallen from .500 in 2025 to .310 in 2026. The splitter has become another weapon, too, producing a 47.1% strikeout rate and holding hitters to a .265 slugging percentage.
There are still some reasons to expect a little regression. His 86.2% strand rate is well above the league average of 72.3%, and his 3.00 expected ERA plus 2.93 SIERA suggest he’s more like a very good reliever than an untouchable one. But even that version would be a major win for the Yankees.
The contract situation only adds to the intrigue. Because Headrick spent most of 2024 on the minor league injured list and was moved around last season, he entered 2026 with less than one year of service time.
He’ll finish this year with close to two years, which means 2027 remains another pre-arbitration season. If he were already arbitration-eligible, he’d have a strong case for a solid raise from his near-minimum $792.7K salary.
Instead, he could still make less than $1MM while working as one of the Yankees’ most effective relievers.
That setup also gives the Yankees some protection against the usual volatility that comes with bullpen arms. Even elite relievers rarely sustain this kind of production for long, and the club has shown little appetite for multi-year deals in the bullpen. According to the Contract Tracker, the last time the Yankees extended a reliever was in November 2019, when they added one year and $18MM to Aroldis Chapman’s deal.
So while an extension looks essentially off the table, Headrick’s place in the bullpen has changed dramatically. He’s done enough in 2026 to earn another shot in 2027, and if he keeps this level going, he could set himself up for bigger arbitration paydays in 2028 and beyond.
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