Fernando Cruz's Outlook With Yankees Is Surging After Tuesday's Performance

Fernando Cruz's stock is skyrocketing after his performance in Tuesday's win vs. the Guardians. | Brad Penner-Imagn Images

It's clear that the Yankees' bullpen gets thin when it's overworked. It's just the nature of the beast when it employs two long relievers, so on a night when David Bednar was unavailable because he worked two straight days, Fernando Cruz was thrust into the closer role in Tuesday's game against the Guardians.

It may have been Cruz's best performance yet as a Yankee. He came into the eighth inning to clean up Jake Bird's mess. After a Daniel Schneemann single and a walk to Brayan Rocchio, the Guardians were threatening to tie the game late, with one out already on the board. He struck out Travis Bazzana, and then José Ramírez lined out to center field.

Cruz's night was not finished, though. He stayed in for the ninth. Despite walking Chase DeLauter, he cut right through the heart of the order in the ninth. Kyle Manzardo went down swinging on a nasty splitter. Then Rhys Hoskins also went down on four pitches. The finishing touch was that splitter.

Fernando Cruz slams the door shut with three strikeouts to pick up his first save since April of last season! pic.twitter.com/bKYiPkTz5i

— Talkin' Yanks (@TalkinYanks) June 10, 2026

Cruz then closed out the game with one more splitter. Guardians left fielder Angel Martinez went down on that pitch as well. That final out sealed the series for the Yankees, who, to this point, had been struggling with winning games against teams over .500.

A more prominent role for Cruz?

Going with Cruz comes with some risk, even if his numbers have been solid with the Yankees.

During a two-year stretch in which the Yankees have been searching for bullpen answers, he has a 2.91 ERA in 77 1/3 innings across 81 outings. This season, Cruz's 1.84 ERA is his best as a full-time player; he's already matched his career-high win total (three) while striking out 11.4 batters per nine innings.

Numbers aside, the thing with Cruz is that if the splitter is not on, he tends to get wild. Even then, opposing batters are only batting .130 with a .209 wOBA and a 54.4% whiff rate against that pitch this season, according to Baseball Savant.

Despite those concerns, Cruz's ability to get a five-out save, in which he struck out four batters, should turn some heads. This is especially the case if the likes of Camilo Doval and Jake Bird have not been wholly dependable this year.

Fernando Cruz's performance has been huge for a Yankees bullpen that's featured some underperforming arms. | Kevin Jairaj-Imagn Images

The fact that it was Doval coming in earlier and Cruz closing things out shows that the pen arm with the most devastating splitter in the game could be moving up the trust tree. Doval entered the game in the seventh, and that could have easily been Cruz's lane, but Yankees manager Aaron Boone got creative and waited until the eighth to go to him.

In the end, it worked out. It will be interesting to see if Cruz is used more prominently than he has been from this point on.

A gift from above

After the 3-2 win on Tuesday, Cruz said that the splitter is a gift from God. Even he is amazed by it.

"All I can say, and I'm going to say it a thousand times, it's my gift from God," Cruz said, according to NJ.com's Randy Miller. "It's just something that I don't really understand. It's a supernatural pitch that I have. Watching guys swinging over it or below it, it's an amazing thing. I'm here because of His gift. He gave the gift to me, and I'm really grateful for it."

Cruz has pitched on consecutive days seven times so far this season, making it interesting to see if he'll get to use his God-gifted splitter again during Wednesday's clash with the Guardians.