As the New York Yankees continue to wait for Cody Bellinger’s free-agency decision, another player should receive equal attention from the club’s front office: Milwaukee Brewers starting pitcher Freddy Peralta. Bellinger has been the Yankees’ No. 1 free-agent priority this offseason, and Peralta should be the team’s No. 1 focus on the trade market.
The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal and Will Sammon have reported the Brewers ideally want a young, major-league-ready starting pitcher included in any trade proposal. The Yankees are well-positioned to meet Milwaukee’s demands for a Peralta replacement because of their pitching depth in the majors and the upper levels of the minors.
Peralta, 29, would be a rental, as he’s under contract for only the 2026 season, at $8 million. But the Yankees have made major trades in back-to-back offseasons to acquire players in their final season before they reached free agency (Juan Soto, Devin Williams). The Williams trade worked out nicely for the Brewers last season, as Caleb Durbin emerged as their everyday third baseman, and he’s under team control through the 2031 season. Milwaukee was also able to flip Nestor Cortes at the trade deadline to the San Diego Padres for speedy outfielder Brandon Lockridge.
The Yankees and Brewers should see if there’s another move to be made this year.
Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said last month at the Winter Meetings that he’s not afraid of making another trade for a player with one year of team control remaining, despite knowing that Soto and Williams did not re-sign with the club.
“Because we’re the New York Yankees, we’re always in that short-term mode,” Cashman said. “I won’t recommend importing a guy with one year of control left if I don’t feel like they can make a big difference in trying to help us push through and be the final team standing. … I think if you’re in a big market that’s constantly trying to win, (giving up control) becomes less relevant.”
For the third straight offseason, the Yankees should operate in short-term mode.
Why should the Yankees want Peralta?
Freddy Peralta has had three straight seasons of at least 30 starts and more than 200 strikeouts. (Patrick McDermott / Getty Images)
To answer the question simply, Peralta is one of the very best starting pitchers in MLB.
The Yankees could use another front-line starter because of the concerns about the rotation. Gerrit Cole will return from Tommy John surgery, and there’s no guarantee he’ll return to Cy Young Award form. Carlos Rodón had surgery to remove a bone spur in his left elbow, and he’s projected to be back by early May, if there are no setbacks. But Rodón also had a career-high workload (195 1/3 innings) last season. Given his injury-prone track record, that should not give the organization warm and fuzzy feelings regarding his 2026 outlook. Clarke Schmidt is recovering from his second Tommy John procedure and won’t be available until the second half of the season.
Max Fried, Cam Schlittler, Will Warren and Rodón all had career-high innings pitched last season, and high workloads are a major risk factor for injuries the following season. Peralta is also coming off a career-high workload. But he has been durable over the past three seasons, making at least 30 starts each year.
The Yankees should look to add as much depth to their rotation as possible. The more quality a team has in its rotation, the better it can handle inevitable injuries. The 2025 Los Angeles Dodgers were a good example of this. One of the biggest reasons they ended up winning the World Series was their immense starting pitching depth, which allowed them to weather all the injuries they endured in the regular season. By the time the postseason arrived, some of their starters, like Roki Sasaki, were able to bolster a bullpen that needed it.
Peralta had a career-best 2.70 ERA in 2025, ranking seventh among MLB pitchers. The underlying metrics suggest he wasn’t as elite as his ERA appears. His FIP was 3.64 and his expected ERA was 3.47, but both marks still ranked in the top 15 among starting pitchers.
The biggest draw for Peralta is his ability to miss bats. Only seven starters had a higher strikeout percentage last season than Peralta. His slider, curveball and changeup each had a whiff percentage over 34 percent. His fastball is his most-used pitch, and there’s room for it to be used less often, to better highlight his special breaking and off-speed pitches.
Importantly for his fit with the Yankees, Peralta is a fly-ball pitcher, but he did an excellent job of limiting hard contact in 2025. Only 12 starters had a better xwOBA, which measures contact quality, than Peralta last season.
Peralta probably isn’t a No. 1 starter for the Yankees, but he has the talent to take the ball in Game 2 for the club in the postseason. If all of the Yankees’ starters were healthy, they could roll out a rotation that featured Fried, Peralta, Cole, Rodón and Schlittler as their top five. And if each of them pitches to his potential, that would be the best rotation in the American League.
Who could be included in a potential trade?
Luis Gil or Will Warren could be options in a potential trade. (Vaughn Ridley/Getty Images)
The Brewers are looking to add young, controllable pitching in a Peralta trade, and the Yankees have a few options for them to consider.
Schlittler should be off-limits in a trade for Peralta. Warren or Luis Gil should be available in a possible deal.
Gil won’t be a free agent until 2029 and will make $2.16 million in his first year of arbitration. He’s coming off a disappointing season marred by a lat injury, which sidelined him for the first four months. In his 11 starts, Gil’s velocity fluctuated, and his lack of command forced him to dial back his fastball to throw strikes. Gil was electric in the first half of the 2024 season, but he faded down the stretch and has had difficulty staying healthy throughout his career. When he’s right, it’s clear Gil has the potential to be special. If the Brewers believe Gil is the first-half-of-2024 version of himself, the Yankees should let them see if they are right.
Warren wasn’t projected to be in the Yankees’ rotation in 2025, but he ended up making 33 starts. He comes with three-plus pitches, but he wasn’t able to deliver consistent results from start to start. The Brewers could look to his above-average strikeout percentage and two consecutive years in the minors with elite whiff numbers as evidence he could put it all together in the majors. He’s still a pre-arbitration player for the next two seasons, which would give Milwaukee payroll flexibility.
But it wouldn’t just take one of those two starters to get a deal done. Peralta is arguably the best starting pitcher available this offseason, even including the free-agent crop of Dylan Cease, Framber Valdez and Ranger Suárez.
That means the Yankees might have to part with either Elmer Rodríguez or Carlos Lagrange, their top two pitching prospects.
Rodríguez is closer to the big leagues and was named the Yankees’ minor league player of the year last season by Baseball America. The Yankees acquired him last offseason by trading catcher Carlos Narváez to the Boston Red Sox. Since then, Rodríguez has quickly developed into one of New York’s best overall prospects. He finished 2025 with a 2.58 ERA across 26 starts and 176 strikeouts in 150 innings.
Lagrange has tantalizing talent. No one in the organization throws harder; his fastball has been clocked at over 103 mph. There is some reliever risk with Lagrange because the command is so spotty. As of now, the Yankees view him as a starter.
“As a development rule of thumb, you probably want to give a guy a shot to start as long as he can,” Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake said last season. “If he needs to peel back into the bullpen, obviously that’s something he’d be able to do with the fastball he’s got. I think right now, we view him as a starter in the long run.”
If Lagrange could improve his command, he would have a higher ceiling than Rodríguez. But can the Yankees wait for that possibility while their championship window with Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton and Cole continues to get smaller? That’s why the club should be trying to make win-now moves, like a trade for Peralta.
The Yankees could also offer the Brewers one of their top hitting prospects, such as Spencer Jones or Dillon Lewis. Shortstops George Lombard Jr. and Dax Kilby are widely considered unavailable in trades. Jones would give Milwaukee a much-needed power element that it does not have on the roster, while Lewis is considered the best outfield defender in the Yankees’ system and has quickly risen to be among the club’s best prospects.
The Yankees could put together an impressive package for Peralta, but landing him might be difficult. The New York Mets and Boston Red Sox, two teams that could still be in the market for starting pitching, could offer similarly strong proposals.
Pitching is the Yankees’ biggest problem right now. Landing Peralta would go a long way toward quieting some of the questions that surround this staff.