Since the start of the season, the New York Yankees’ pitching staff has already proven to be a massive issue. The returns of Clarke Schmidt and Luis Gil will undoubtedly help the rotation overcome its early woes, but the bullpen appears to be a different case altogether.
The Yankee relief corps has already suffered its fair share of blowups. This makes their latest Adam Ottavino decision somewhat puzzling. Ottavino was signed and designated for assignment twice by the Yankees in the span of a week. It seems as though whenever the Yankees need two-thirds of an inning pitched, they sign Ottavino, bringing him in through a revolving door that sees him come and go in a disheartening fashion. After his second stint with the Yankees in one week, Ottavino has now accumulated a total of 1.2 scoreless innings over the course of three outings on the year; not even two innings in three appearances.
And if the Ottavino odyssey is head-scratching, the Yankees’ next move was downright stupefying. Despite throwing 5.1 scoreless innings with a jaw-dropping total of nine strikeouts and surrendering just one hit, the Yankees illogically decided to option Brent Headrick to Triple-A. One of the Yankees’ new acquisitions, Headrick has thrown more innings than any Yankee reliever this season besides Fernando Cruz and has some of the best results.
But other than mind-blowing Headrick decision and the Ottavino merry-go-round, the Yankees made another strange decision coming out of spring training. As of now, it seems there are two moves the Yankees could make that would help solidify their wobbly bullpen: recall Headrick and promote Yerry De Los Santos.
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Yerry De Los Santos’ strong case for promotion to Yankees
After an impressive spring, De Los Santos seemed like a lock to make the Opening Day roster. In 9.1 innings, he surrendered only two runs while recording nine strikeouts; some of the best results on the team.
De Los Santos spent two years pitching for the Pittsburgh Pirates accumulating a total of 50 innings pitched. Over that period in 2022 and 2023, he posted a 4.14 ERA. In 2024, De Los Santos found himself with the Yankees but never reached the major-league level. In Triple-A that season, he threw 59 innings to the tune of a 4.12 ERA. But his results started trending in the right direction after he fully developed a solid splitter. This season in Triple-A, De Los Santos has thrown 3.1 scoreless innings.
With his new weapon producing great results, one would think we would see De Los Santos in the majors sometime this year. However, with many relievers coming off the injury list in the future and the low priority we’ve already seen the Yankees give De Los Santos, this is uncertain.