This week’s Mailbag looks at a potential Gavin Williams extension, the Cardinals’ wealth of catching talent, reasons for optimism in Miami, and Shohei Ohtani’s future as a two-way player.
Let’s get into it!
Kyle asks:
When does Cleveland extend Gavin Williams or do they trade him? Do you think he can win a CY at some point?
I’ll start this answer by acknowledging a mea culpa of sorts when it comes to Williams. I’ve been down on him, relatively speaking anyway, for a couple years now due to his command (or lack thereof). I know earlier this season in one of my chats here at MLBTR, I said that while I think he’s a fine mid-rotation arm, he’s not an ace and didn’t seem to have the command to be that. Williams had the third-highest walk rate of any qualified starter from 2023-25 and the second-highest of any pitcher (min. 200 innings) from 2024-25.
In the months since that time, Williams has radically reduced his walk rate while simultaneously sending his strikeout rate soaring north of 33%. He hasn’t necessarily done it by throwing more strikes. He’s actually throwing pitches within the strike zone at a career-low rate. However, Williams has enjoyed an enormous gain in chases off the plate; from 2023-25, his opponents chased just 26.8% of his pitches outside the strike zone (26% flat last year). In 2026, that number has skyrocketed to 33.5%. Accordingly, Williams’ swinging-strike rate has spiked from 11.5% to a huge 14.7%. That ties him with Philadelphia’s Cristopher Sánchez for second-best among all qualified starters, trailing only the likely NL Cy Young Award winner, Jacob Misiorowski.
Across the board, Williams’ stuff looks better. His four-seamer averaged 96.6 mph in each of the past two seasons (and 95.7 mph in 2024). This year, it’s jumped to an average of 97.6 mph. Williams has more than doubled the usage of the two-seamer with which he tinkered last year, throwing it at a 16.1% clip. It’s surely no coincidence that he’s sporting his second consecutive better-than-average ground-ball rate. He’s throwing both his slider and curveball harder and more frequently than ever. Williams has scrapped his changeup entirely and scaled back the use of his cutter and four-seamer to career-low levels.
All those changes have clearly worked in his favor. Williams has been strangely homer-prone (1.50 HR/9), but his 17.6% homer-to-flyball ratio should regress. He entered the season with a career 11.5% mark in that regard — right in line with the 11.6% league average. Homer-to-flyball ratio tends to level off around 12% in any given season on a leaguewide basis, and most pitchers live in that range over large enough samples.
Williams’ ERA is up considerably this year, from 3.06 to 3.78, but the 2026 version of his skill set looks far more appealing then the 2025 version. Last year, he got by with a low BABIP (.254) and huge strand rate (83.8%). This year, he has an elite strikeout rate and better-than-average walk rate — the former being supported by improved stuff and big gains in terms of chases and whiffs. This version of Williams looks like a credible No. 1 or No. 2 starter for any playoff club, and metrics like SIERA (2.78) and xFIP (2.88) support that. He still gives up too much hard contact, but if he’s missing bats, limiting walks and inducing grounders at this level, sign me up as a newfound, full-fledged Gavin Williams believer.
Now then, onto the matter of whether Cleveland will extend him and what it might cost to do so!
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