Role
Payton Tolle opened 2026 in Worcester and came up for good on April 23, when he struck out 11 Yankees in six innings in his first start. He never left the rotation. He went 9-6 with a 3.03 ERA in 26 starts, with 171 strikeouts and 40 walks in 148.2 innings, and he started Game 1 of the Wild Card Series (4.2 innings, one run) before Chad Tracy pulled him with two outs in the fifth. In 2027 he's a rotation lock, and with Sonny Gray a free agent he could be the No. 2 behind Garrett Crochet.
Outlook
MLB Pipeline put him on its All-Rookie team. Among pitchers with at least 140 innings, MLB.com had him 17th in ERA and 10th in FIP, and noted that few pitchers got more chases (36.4 percent). His four-seamer averaged 96.1 mph, and with the sinker and cutter he threw some kind of fastball almost 90 percent of the time, per MLB's pitch data. He turns 24 on Nov. 1.
Our take: the curveball (9.3 percent) and changeup (2.8 percent) are barely there, and hitters will spend 2027 sitting on heaters. The fastballs already work, though, and a 6-foot-6 lefty with 7.4 feet of extension gets the benefit of the doubt from us. We think he's the best pitcher on this staff by August.