Damning Luis Gil metrics show he's on last leg with Yankees heading into Red Sox game

Remember when the New York Yankees sent Luis Gil down to work on his mechanics to start the season? His final spring start came with those new mechanics in place and drove optimism, and the stint at Scranton was only supposed to ingrain them further into him. Since he's come back, well, now we're all wondering what the point was.

Gil has made two starts and has posted a 7.00 ERA over nine innings. His strikeouts are still down, just as they had fallen last year following his 2024 AL ROY campaign. The walks? They're still sky high.

In fact, dating back to last season, the level of ineptitude he's displayed on the mound is absolutely stunning. It makes you wonder how this guy ever looked like a potential front-of-the-rotation arm. We wish we knew what happened after that lat injury, but it appears things are broken.

Could Tuesday night's outing against the Red Sox be the last straw if he can't put together a solid showing?

Gil ranks at the bottom in many important advanced metrics among the 325-man cohort listed above. From the data set, the most damning might be his ranking dead last in SIERA (5.63) and xFIP (5.60), as those two metrics isolate pitcher performance and are two of the best indicators of future performance. They tell us that Gil will continue to underwhelm.

The Yankees missed the boat on capitalizing on Luis Gil's value

Over the offseason, it was clear that the most valuable asset on the trade market was controllable, young starting pitching. It didn't necessarily need to be good pitching. Simply put, if a hurler was relatively young, cheap, and had potential, he could be swapped for a haul.

Grayson Rodriguez netted Taylor Ward, who was coming off a 36-homer season. Shane Baz netted the Rays a treasure trove of prospects. Mike Burrows got Brandon Lowe to Pittsburgh and forced the Astros to surrender their best pitching prospect and their No. 1 overall prospect. The Yankees even gave up a quartet of intriguing youngsters for Ryan Weathers.

Gil was more accomplished than all of them. He entered 2026 with three full years of team control. He could have brought New York either an impact veteran or a group of promising prospects. And as we've seen with his performance this year, the Yankees wouldn't have missed anything and likely would have gotten better production out of Ryan Yarbrough in the rotation.

Now, though, who would give up anything of value to acquire Gil? No one. Given what the analytics say, he'll continue struggling, though he won't get that opportunity much longer. Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodón will be back soon, mercifully booting Gil from the rotation.

Where does he go from there? There was some chatter in the media over the offseason that Gil might be better suited for bullpen duty. The Yankees need to find a way to fix their shaky bullpen, though at this juncture, there aren't many avenues to get things back on track aside from internal improvement. Injecting Gil into the mix might help. But if he pitches like he's been in the rotation, it could be a disaster.

Right now, it seems that the best-case scenario for Gil is to become an effective reliever. That's objectively less valuable than a capable starter. Given the state of the market over the offseason, it would be worth significantly less than whatever he could have returned in a trade. And, of course, that's assuming he's actually good in the 'pen. That's not a guarantee. What is clear is Gil isn't working out, and his trade value has plummeted.

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