The Yankees’ rotation looked set when the month of February started, but the back surgery left-hander James Paxton recently underwent threw a wrench in their plans. They’re now lacking an obvious answer after Gerrit Cole, Luis Severino, Masahiro Tanaka and J.A. Happ. The team will give plenty of hurlers chances to emerge as its No. 5 during spring training, though, as Bryan Hoch of MLB.com relays.
General manager Brian Cashman on Wednesday named five pitchers – Luis Cessa, Deivi Garcia, Jonathan Loaisiga, Michael King and Jordan Montgomery – as candidates to take the last spot in New York’s rotation. The leader may be the 27-year-old Montgomery, who had an impressive rookie campaign in 2017 but hasn’t been much of a factor since then because of injury troubles. Montgomery underwent Tommy John surgery in June 2018 after throwing a mere 27 1/3 innings that year, though he did make a late-season return to a major league mound in 2019. Manager Aaron Boone said Wednesday that Montgomery’s now “in a good place” with respect to his health.
As for Montgomery’s competition, Cessa and Loaisiga have each garnered a decent amount of experience at the game’s highest level. Cessa’s heater checks in around 95 mph, but it hasn’t led to great results in the majors. He’s the owner of a 4.50 ERA/4.98 FIP with 7.37 K/9 and 2.91 BB/9 in 232 career innings. Most of his work (67 of 86 appearances) has come as a reliever. Cessa is out of minor league options, so he could end up in another organization if he doesn’t make the Yankees this spring.
Loaisiga can throw even harder than Cessa (96-97 mph), and he’s a former top-100 prospect, but his MLB production hasn’t been special, either. While Loaisiga recorded a tremendous strikeout rate of 11.18 per nine in his first 56 1/3 innings as a Yankee from 2018-19, he walked almost five per nine and only registered a 4.79 ERA/4.33 FIP. Moreover, the right-hander dealt with shoulder problems last season.
Neither Garcia nor King has appeared in the majors yet, but there’s plenty of promise in the two cases. FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen ranked the 20-year-old Garcia as the game’s 42nd-best prospect Wednesday, calling the 5-foot-10, 163-pounder “a diminutive firecracker righty with a beautiful curveball.” However, because of his size, there are questions about Garcia’s durability. He also didn’t put up great numbers last year as an extremely young Triple-A pitcher, as he managed a subpar 5.40 ERA/5.77 FIP with 10.13 K/9 and 4.5 BB/9 over 40 innings at the level.
King, 24, racked up a combined 62 2/3 innings in Triple-A from 2018-19, pitching to a sterling 2.30 ERA with 8.5 K/9 and 1.7 BB/9 in that span. He even made a one-appearance MLB debut last season, and currently ranks as the Yankees’ 19th-best prospect at MLB.com.
Considering how volatile the back end of most teams’ rotations are, it’s entirely possible (maybe even likely) that more than one of the above hurlers will start games for the Yankees as they await Paxton’s return. The World Series hopefuls figure to get Paxton back early in the summer, so those who wind up filling his spot could be on borrowed time in that role.
King actually has appeared in the majors, although easy to miss as it was only 2 innings…
Same thing I was about to comment! 1 game, 2 innings!
Just can’t catch a break with paxton
He had a bad injury history in Seattle. It is no shock
As opposed to those good injury histories
a good injury history would be one with not a lot of injuries, idk why youre being a bit of a smart alec here
Montgomery is the front runner for that last spot
Yep. Barring injury, I’d say he’s a lock. He was very good as a rookie. Should be fully healthy now. I think he’ll be a great 3 or 4 in the very near future.
Yankess will also have back the guy thats suspened also and hes pitched good for them
Yeah, but German still has to serve 63 more games of his suspension…by the time he’s eligible to return Paxton should theoretically be close to return as well. German won’t factor into New York’s early-season rotation plans.
Can German play in the minors during the suspension? If not, he’s going to have to spend a little time in the minors to get ready for the majors. Probably wouldn’t take long… as long as he stays ready. Maybe 2 or 3 starts at AAA just to make sure he’s ready. That’s like an additional 15 to 20 days.
Yes, they’re usually allowed to play in minor league “rehab” games a couple of weeks or so before their suspension is technically up.
I think I remember hearing about players do rehab stints while still suspended so I believe so
That makes sense. Otherwise it’s actually an 80 game suspension.
It was an 80 game suspension; he served 17 last fall.
Since both would have innings caps this could all be a blessing.
German and Paxton at full strength for the playoffs and extra innings for a large group of prospects over the first couple of months.
Perfect timing with Tanaka, Paxton and Happ all being free agents. The question is how good would the young guys have to be to trade the free agents at the deadline…
The Yankee’s season is the post season so they’re not going to have a “for sale” sign out at the deadline.
Good? He won 18 through early September.
Don’t talk about wins… these cyber guys think wins mean nothing… it’s how much spinny the put on the bally thingy.
Lol you’re so dumb
LOL, if ya don’t like them newfangled “analytucks”, then take a gander at his 4.03 ERA there.
Hopefully they don’t tip the pitches like they have been.
Was pretty easy to see what was coming
Bang, bang goes the trash can. Or just buzzzzzzzzz along until you get your pitch. Word craft, my peeps.
Not too hard when your have a catcher who should be playing DH.
Stop being a troll. You have to have better things to do.
Wait until he tries to catch Cole’s stuff.
The guy is from Louisiana, he definitely has nothing better to do
Uh, King has appeared in the majors…..
Yankees managed to go all of last season without Cessa making a start and were probably better off for it. Jordan Montgomery if healthy likely gets the 5th spot in the rotation.
⬆️⬆️. This dude didn’t go there Anyway. They can always start Chad green and finish with the bullpen
That rotation is still crappy sorry
Most teams would love to have Cole, Severino and Tanaka at the top. Really crappy.
That’s not the Severino and Tanaka of from 3 years ago.
Maybe a 4 team deal can be worked out with yankees dodgers cubs and nats can be worked out where
Yankees end up with Davis and Feddie
Nats Joc
Cubs anjuar (sp) plus others including stripling and other minor leaguers
Dodgers Minor leaguers and picks
This is a starting point
Starting point for what?
Meant to say yankees get Bryant in 4 team trade
Yankees have Urshela and Andujar, and can also slide Torres or LeMahieu over to 3B. Unless Bryant is open to learning how to pitch very, very quickly trading for him would be pointless
Lotta questions in YANKEES rotation
Where are they with Domingo German?
He’s suspended for 63 games and eligible for return on June 6.
Montgomery is the obvious 5th starter and a good one at that. He’s back and recovered from TJS. Paxton will be back in May, German in June.
Thought Yankees should give Matt Harvey a minor league deal. Never have enough pitching
I say let them duke it out for #5. I wonder how long Happ’s leash is if he can’t regain form coming out of the gate. Wouldn’t mind seeing opener Green > Happ (3+ IP) > reliever as a stopgap until German returns.
Yankees should trade for Price…
A lot of bad teams in the AL still. They should be fine until late in the year/October.