Chance Adams’ debut bodes well for the Yankees’ future

Chance Adams didn’t pitch well enough to get the Yankees a win in his MLB debut, but the way he threw the ball bodes well for the team’s long-term health.

The Yankees picked an awfully difficult time to hand Chance Adams his Major League debut. Pitching against a loaded Red Sox lineup in Fenway Park can make veterans weak in the knees. Adams didn’t do enough to get his team a big win against Boston, but he did show real signs of being a meaningful part of the team’s future.

It would have been easy for Adams to crumble on the mound after a really difficult first inning. He gave up a two-run homer to Mitch Moreland in the opening frame and it looked like the Yankees’ bullpen might be headed for another long outing. Fortunately, Adams settled down after that and didn’t really get hit again until giving up a home run to J.D. Martinez in the fourth. Overall, Adams only gave up three hits and one walk over his five innings of work.

Giving up three runs in five innings likely won’t be enough to keep Adams in the Bronx for very long. It’s safe to assume he’ll head back to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre very soon. That does not, however, mean that Adams did anything to lower the organization’s expectations of him. In fact, his outing at Fenway should have the opposite effect.

Now it’s possible that Adams could find his way in the Yankees’ rotation as soon as 2019. He still faces an uphill climb, but he will get an opportunity to compete for a spot next Spring. It’s very possible that Adams, Justus Sheffield and Luis Severino can form the bedrock of the team’s rotation for years to come.

Severino is really the only one of the five current starters whose place in the club’s rotation over the next few seasons is safe. Masahiro Tanaka and CC Sabathia will both drop off the radar due to age in the near future. Sonny Gray is a strong candidate to be offloaded this summer. Neither J.A. Happ or Lance Lynn profiles to be a long-term solution for the club.

Free agent acquisitions will definitely play a role in filling the four spots next to Severino, but Brian Cashman needs a couple of internal options to step up and become above average major league starters. The team simply cannot afford to pay four big time free agents to fill out the five-man rotation.

Now that Adams has shown he’s capable of producing a decent start under very difficult circumstances, he is in the same band of Yankee prospects as Sheffield and Domingo German. That’s a significant step up from where he was just a few days ago. Credit Adams for pitching well enough against the Red Sox to raise his stock within the Yankees organization