SARASOTA, Fla — While the Yankees lost their spring opener to the Orioles, there was something in the game that should get fans excited. Elmer Rodriguez.
The Yankees acquired the right-hander in a trade with the Boston Red Sox in December of 2024 in exchange for catcher Carlos Narváez.
The 21-year-old right-hander ascended through three minor league levels — High-A Hudson Valley, Double-A Somerset, and Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. Across 27 appearances (26 starts), he posted an 11-8 record with a dominant 2.58 ERA and a 1.07 WHIP. His most impressive feat was racking up 176 strikeouts over 150 innings, the second-most in all of Minor League Baseball. This performance earned him the title of Baseball America’s Yankees Minor League Player of the Year and a spot on the team’s 40-man roster.
Rodriguez was sitting between 94 and 96 in his bullpen sessions and live batting practice. Today, he got the start.
Rodriguez pitched three scoreless innings. While he only struck out one batter, he did not walk a batter, and he was able to get a key double play in the second inning.
It was not like he saw and exhabition lineup. The entire starting lineup he faced was full of regulars. For someone who struggled at AAA to end the 2025 season, today was a great sign for his development.
Rodriguez was absolutely dealing today, showcasing a masterclass in changing eye levels and disrupting timing. While his heater grabbed the headlines by topping out at 97 MPH, it was the devastating synergy between his secondary pitches that truly left hitters guessing. The late-fading action on his changeup acted as the perfect foil to his sharp, sweeping slider, creating a “tunneling” effect that made both pitches look identical out of the hand before breaking in opposite directions. This north-south and east-west movement profile forced a staggering number of empty swings, proving that while his raw velocity sets the floor, his elite pitch sequencing and ability to generate whiffs in the dirt are what provide his true ceiling as a starter.
With the 2026 World Baseball Classic just weeks away, Rodriguez’s dominant performance today couldn’t have come at a better time for Team Puerto Rico. Stepping into a heightened role for a roster missing several veteran mainstays, he looks every bit the frontline starter they need to navigate competitive lineups. His ability to maintain velocity while deep in a count suggests his conditioning is already in mid-season form, a critical factor given the strict pitch-count limits in early WBC rounds.
If he can continue to tunnel that late-breaking slider off his high-velocity fastball, he won’t just be an “arm to watch” — he’ll be the X-factor capable of leading Puerto Rico back to the knockout stage in Miami, and possibly hold the same role for a Yankees team hunting a championship in 2026.
