The Yankees announced today that they have claimed righty Jake Barrett off waivers from the Pirates. Fellow right-hander Ben Heller was shifted to the 60-day injured  list while he continues to recover from Tommy John surgery.

Barrett already spent the offseason bouncing between rosters; now he’s doing so again to open the season. He’ll start things off at Triple-A with the New York organization, where he’ll represent a depth option should a need arise in the big league pen.

As we’ve now discussed several times in recent months, Barrett is looking to rediscover the form he showed back in 2016, when as a 24-year-old rookie, he gave the Diamondbacks 59 1/3 innings of 3.49 ERA ball with nearly a strikeout per inning. He’s posted a 5.03 ERA in 34 big league innings since that time and spent most of 2018 at Triple-A, pitching to a 2.87 ERA with 11.3 K/9 and 4.9 BB/9 over 53 1/3 innings.

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