Who Will Be the 5th Starter on Opening Day?

by E.J. Fagan

March 20, 2024

***

Gerrit Cole is out until at least late May. Someone is going to break camp in the big league rotation. After the Juan Soto trade, the Yankees don’t have a default 6th starter left over from the 2023 season. The competition is wide open.

Who would win? Here are the sweepstakes:

The Pre-Season Favorite: Will Warren

Will Warren was a consensus top-10 Yankee prospect this offseason. It’s easy to see why. Warren spent most of the 2023 season at Triple-A. He excelled despite the crazy robo-umpire run environment, posting a 3.61 ERA in a league where the average ERA was 5.17. I don’t want to dig too deeply into his other stats because of the robo-umpire oddness, other than to point out that Warren had a rough first two months and second two months. Good signs.

Scouting reports on Warren seem to converge on his future as a relatively safe mid-rotation starter. No one thinks he is an ace, despite a slider that often earns 60-70 grades (Baseball Prospectus called it “one of the best in all of the minors.”) Warren struggled in 2023 against left-handed hitters quite a bit due to a poor changeup.

Warren is not on the 40-man roster, but the Yankees have a few easy moves to clear a spot for him, with Cole, Dominguez and Peraza headed to the 60-day.

The Fangraphs Pick: Clayton Beeter

Clayton Beeter is currently on top of the 5th starter depth charts for the Yankees on Fangraphs. He’s on the 40-man. He split the 2023 season between Double-A and Triple-A. Beeter makes sense as the default option to start in the majors.

But let’s talk about why I doubt he will start. Pretty much every scouting report pegs his ceiling as a future late-inning reliever. While he has a killer fastball-slider-curveball mix (Fangraphs grades all three pitches as 60), consistency is clearly a problem. Beeter did not thrive in robo-umpire Triple-A, walking way too many batters and posting an average-ish 4.94 ERA. Major league hitters aren’t going to swing at his good stuff if he can’t consistently throw strikes.

It sure feels like Beeter is only still starting because the Yankees are short on depth.* I’m not sure when we’ll see him as a relief pitcher, but it wouldn’t shock me to see that conversation happen real soon. Especially because of who is next on this list.

*FWIW, he’s had pretty solid control in Spring Training.

Mr. Stuff: Luis Gil

Remember him? Gil made a strong impression as a spot starter during the 2021 season. His Statcast page is pretty crazy:

Gil had some of the best stuff in the league. Batters couldn’t hit him. He combined a fastball that averaged 96 mph with some of the best extension in the league. The downside? Gil had absolutely awful control. He walked 4+ batters in half his 2021 starts. It always felt like he was one pitch away from going full Rick Ankiel.

Gil then missed almost all of the 2022 and all of the 2023 season with Tommy John surgery. I think we all forgot about him, including most of the top Yankee prospect lists.

But it turns out that Gil came out of Tommy John even better than when he went into it. His velocity has ticked up to 99 mph. His changeup and slider look unhittable. He’s only walked 4 batters in 11 2/3 innings. He’s still just 25 years old. If his control remains merely average, Luis Gil could win a freaking Cy Young.

The Bad Pick: Luke Weaver

Luke Weaver is a bad major league starting pitcher. He posted an ERA over 6.00 in both 2023 and 2022. His career ERA is over 5.00. I’m utterly puzzled as why Weaver earned a $2 million major league contract this year. The dude is a below replacement level starter who should, at best, be eating innings for a last place team in 2024.

But, Weaver is a major league starter. The Yankees might want to keep him stretched out before sending him to the garbage innings bullpen role. If Cole were set to to miss just a week or two, I bet he’s the 5th starter. But it would be a colossal mistake to throw one out of every five games by starting so consistently bad.

A Free Agent

Jordan Montgomery. Michael Lorenzen. They are both available.

You’ve heard enough about Monty, but Lorenzen is an intriguing possibility. The former closer has become a solid-average starting pitcher since converting two years ago. He’s a ground ball guy. He won’t cost that much. I’m honestly confused as to why he’s still a free agent. The Yankees could sign him, then maybe send him into the Luke Weaver role if Cole returns to a healthy rotation.

My Prediction

It’s Gil.

I think the best case scenario for the Yankees would involve Gil spending some time in Triple-A. They even cut him early in camp so they could send him down to minor league Spring Training. But Gil has been so good that he forced his way into the 5th starter conversation.

Gil has real major league experience. My instinct is that he’s a TINSAPP (There Is No Such Thing As A Pitching Prospect) kind of player. He’s either fixed his control or he hasn’t. If he has, he belongs in the major leagues. If he hasn’t, he doesn’t. He doesn’t really have much to learn at Triple-A other than marginal improvements. If Gil walks the ballpark in April, the Yankees can send him down for Warren.

I’m starting to dream on the prospect of a fixed Luis Gil. I’ve talked about him as a Dellin Betances type for awhile, but maybe he’s more of a Luis Severino. Severino at his peak had much better control than Gil, but Gil might have better pure stuff. 99 mph with 90th percentile extension and a big arsenal of secondary pitches? Yes please.