Luis Severino, Henry Owens, Jonathan Gray highlight the next wave of pitching prospects
NEW YORK -- For the first time in more than 75 years, the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees both sent starting pitchers to the mound for their big league debuts in the same series.
The last time was in 1938, and while Boston’s Jim Bagby Jr. made two All-Star Games, neither he nor New York’s Atley Donald won 100 games or generally had the careers the modern-day franchises expect from Henry Owens and Luis Severino, who aren’t just any rookies but the top pitching prospects for the Red Sox and Yankees, respectively.
A few minutes before Owens handed the ball to manager John Farrell and walked off the Yankee Stadium mound on Tuesday night, Colorado Rockies’ top pitching prospect, right-hander Jon Gray, made his debut two time zones to the West.
The first wave of pitching prospect promotions came in May and June. Houston Astros’ Lance McCullers, New York Mets’ Noah Syndergaard and Steven Matz, Chicago White Sox’s Carlos Rodon and Milwaulee Brewers’ Taylor Jungmann have all had starring moments.
Gray, Owens and Severino highlight a second wave.
None of the three completed more than five innings in their debuts, although Owens did start the sixth. Each gave up at least one run in the first two innings, although Severino’s was unearned.
The one key difference, however, is that Gray and Owens were summoned to audition and acclimate at the major league level so that they are comfortable as contributors when their clubs can contend in 2016.
As Farrell said, his staff is trying “to gain as much info as possible on our young guys,” or as Rockies manager Walt Weiss told reporters in Denver, “We've got the big picture in mind.”
Severino, on the other hand, is New York’s stretch-run antidote to a rotation that recently put Michael Pineda on the disabled list for a month; that saw Ivan Nova leave one start early with arm fatigue; that has endured an up-and-down season from CC Sabathia; and that has perpetual unease about the longevity of Masahiro Tanaka’s elbow and forearm health.
Against the Red Sox on Wednesday, Severino became the first pitcher in American League history to allow two or fewer hits, walk none and strike out at least seven in his debut. “I feel the same way I did in Double A, Triple A,” he said through an interpreter. “Same baseball.”
“We’re excited by his ability,” Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said. “We’re excited what he’s done, excited that he’s put himself in the position that we hoped he would. That’s why we played with the innings we did this season.”
Cashman said he filled his rotation vacancy internally because there was no viable trade option at the deadline — in part, he said, because many of his top prospects were injured — but he also foresaw enough potential for Severino that the organization manipulated his pitch counts and innings in the season’s first half so that he’d have no overbearing limitation in the majors.
Severino only threw 99 1/3 minor league innings, the last 61 1/3 over 11 starts at Class AAA with a minuscule 1.91 ERA. New York needs length: its starters rank in the bottom third of the majors in innings, taxing a bullpen that, to date, has been up to the task.
“I think it’s who we are,” New York manager Joe Girardi said. “Obviously it’s not exactly how you draw it up.”
Severino only stands 6’0” and weighs less than 200 pounds, but he unleashed a fastball as speedy as 98 in his debut. Even his change up averaged 88, and combinations like the one he used against Boston’s Brock Holt were unfair. After falling behind 2-and-0, he threw three fastballs of ascending velocity (95, 96, 97) and varying height, the last of which was belt-high before Severino spun a 92-mile-per-hour slider down and in, below Holt’s eye level and bat for a strikeout.
Though he allowed two runs (one earned) in his five innings and took the loss, several fans behind the home dugout stood to cheer at the end of his night.
“Pitching in New York is not easy,” Cashman said. “It’s definitely different. It’s easier, I think, for guys coming up from the system than, at times, for guys from the outside.”
All three are homegrown: Severino was signed for $225,000 as an international free agent; Gray was picked No. 3 overall in 2013; Owens was a supplemental first round selection in 2011 that was part of the compensation for losing free agent Victor Martinez.
“I think that’s the dream of every major league general manager, that all international signings and all your draft picks can be the feeder system for your major league team,” Cashman said. “It doesn’t work that way, clearly, but it’s nice when they do.”
Severino, the 14th Yankee to make a big league debut this season, is the franchise’ No. 1 pitching prospect in a decade and, at 21 years, 166 days, the youngest Yankees starter to debut since Phil Hughes in 2007. (Gray and Owens are both 23.)
Gray is a “prototypical power pitcher,” Weiss said, and he too dialed his four-seamer up to 98 mph. He lasted only four innings, allowing three runs (two earned) with four strikeouts, and will have his innings capped tightly.
Owens is a towering 6’6” and Boston’s third lefty prospect to debut, having been preceded by Eduardo Rodriguez and Brian Johnson. His signature is a plus changeup, to go with a low 90s fastball, a curve and an improving slider.
He had little chance of emerging with a win, even though his night ended with Boston leading 3-2. Not only did he exit with runners at second and third with nobody out, but he also entrusted the game to a Red Sox bullpen that, since July 1, has a poor 4.49 ERA, which ranks 26th in baseball during that time.
“He should take away from this a solid feeling that he was going up against an explosive lineup tonight and kept them in check in his first time out,” Farrell said.
“I was anxious to be out here, very excited and very pleased with the opportunity, and I tried to seize it the best I could,” Owens said. “I ran into a couple of tough innings, but hopefully there’s more to come.”
Three hours before he’d take the mound, Owens was lounging on clubhouse couch chatting with David Ortiz’s son. (One of them was already in full uniform; it wasn’t Owens.) Owens was the first player out of the dugout before the bottom of the first, and jogged to the mound. Severino, meanwhile, walked slowly to the foul line, trailing all of his teammates. Wailing over the loud speakers was Fall Out Boy’s chorus, Remember me for centuries.
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