Yankees pitching prospect expected to make MLB debut Friday

The Yankees are promoting right-hander Randy Vásquez to the majors, with the righty telling reporters such as Bryan Hoch of MLB.com that he’ll be starting Friday’s game. That will be his major league debut. He’s already on the 40-man roster but will require an active roster spot between now and then.

Vásquez, 24, was an international amateur out of the Dominican Republic, signing with the Yanks in 2018. He started his professional career in rookie ball in 2018 and 2019 before the minor leagues were canceled by the pandemic in 2020. He followed that up with a strong 2021 wherein he shot from Single-A to High-A and then Double-A. He tossed 107 1/3 innings across those levels with a 2.52 ERA, striking out 28.6% of opponents while walking 8.4%. That showing caused Baseball America to rank him the No. 12 Yankee prospect going into 2022.

Last year, he spent the entire season at Double-A, making 25 starts and tallying 115 1/3 innings. He had a 3.90 ERA, 24.2% strikeout rate, 8.3% walk rate and 48.3% ground ball rate. In November, the club gave him a spot on the 40-man roster to prevent him from being selected in the Rule 5 draft. That solid showing got him bumped to No. 9 on the BA list of top 30 farmhands in the system.

This year, he’s been in Triple-A, making nine starts on the year so far with a 4.85 ERA in 42 2/3 innings. He has a healthy 25.5% strikeout rate and 46% ground ball rate but is walking 11.7% of batters faced on the year.

It’s possible that this will be just a spot start for Vásquez, as Domingo Germán’s 10-game sticky stuff suspension will be over in a couple of days. Once he’s able to return, he should slot back into the rotation next to Gerrit Cole, Nestor Cortes, Luis Severino and Clarke Schmidt. Schmidt has an ERA of 6.00 so far this year and still has an option, so there’s perhaps some chance Vásquez bumps him out. However, Schmidt has solid peripherals but an unlucky .386 batting average on balls in play and 62.7% strand rate. His 4.39 FIP and 3.82 SIERA suggest that regression to the mean might push his ERA down a bit.