NEW YORK — The New York Yankees are off to a 7-2 start, the best record in the American League. But there is a nagging question that refuses to go away.
When they will call up Carlos Lagrange?
With the Yankees bullpen carrying questions heading into the season, and a 22-year-old posting a 101.3 mph fastball in his very first Triple-A appearance, the conversation around Lagrange is gaining volume by the week. The Yankees’ most talked-about flamethrower prospect is no longer just a farm story. He may be knocking on the door.
The Betances shadow looms large
The comparisons to Dellin Betances are everywhere, and they are not hard to understand. Both are Dominican power pitchers. Both came up through the Yankees’ system as starting pitcher prospects. Betances stands 6-foot-8; Lagrange checks in at 6-foot-7. Betances touched triple digits on the radar gun. Lagrange has already blown past that threshold, sitting at 100.5 mph on his four-seamer this spring and touching 103.1 in one spring training outing against the Toronto Blue Jays.
Betances, who retired in 2022 and has been calling games for YES Network this season, was frank when he first heard his name attached to the prospect.
“I tell a lot of people … I never threw 103 (mph) and I never threw 103 in February,” the former Yankees star said. “This kid has the ability to be one of the best starters in the game if he continues to work on his craft.”
Betances earned four straight All-Star selections from 2014 to 2017, posting a 2.36 ERA across 358 appearances during his eight-year Yankees tenure. Shoulder injuries derailed what should have been a longer run. That cautionary tale is not lost on anyone inside the organization.
Boone opens the door
Manager Aaron Boone has been careful with his words all spring and into the early weeks of the season. He wants Lagrange on a starter’s track with innings and consistency. Yet, Boone has not slammed the door on a midseason bullpen role, either.
“As long as he logs some innings,” the Yankees skipper said during spring training, “and that becomes a real need at some point, I think anything’s possible.”
He went further when pressed on what a Betances-type entry might look like.
“You log some innings,” Boone said, “or if especially you get a baseline of innings in the minor leagues, and the need comes up at some point this season to where, ‘OK, that’s the role that exists.’ I don’t think that’s the worst thing, having guys break in in that kind of role.”
That is as close to a green light as the Yankees manager ever gives on a prospect before they have even reached Triple-A.
From spring training to Scranton, the buzz has only grown
Lagrange earned the Yankees’ Most Outstanding Rookie award at the end of spring camp, and for good reason. He struck out 13 batters while allowing just two runs on six hits in 13.2 innings across four spring outings. He walked only four. He did all of this while fanning Judge on a 102.6 mph fastball in a live batting practice session on the very first day of camp.
He opened the minor league season at Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre, the organization’s No. 2 pitching prospect behind Elmer Rodriguez according to MLB Pipeline. In his Triple-A debut, in cold weather up in Buffalo, Lagrange allowed one run on three strikeouts over four innings without issuing a single walk. The fastball dipped slightly in those conditions, but the command held. It was, by any reasonable measure, a solid first step.
ESPN’s Jeff Passan captured the mood around the league during spring.
“It wouldn’t surprise me if Carlos Lagrange is pitching meaningful innings for the Yankees by September, if not sooner,” Passan wrote.
Why the Yankees bullpen question matters right now
The New York Yankees’ 7-2 start has been fueled largely by an exceptional rotation. Max Fried opened the year with a dominant effort and the starting staff allowed just three runs over the club’s first five games. That matched a feat not achieved in the American League since the 1940s.
But the bullpen has been a known concern since last winter. The unit finished 23rd in ERA across the league in 2025. Closer David Bednar and setup pieces Camilo Doval and Fernando Cruz give the Yankees a credible backend. The middle innings, though, remain an open question, particularly as the club awaits the returns of Gerrit Cole (expected in June) and Carlos Rodon (expected in May), along with Clarke Schmidt in the second half.
Betances, watching from the YES Network broadcast booth, thinks that if the bullpen becomes a problem, Lagrange is the solution ready to drop in.
“You can arguably put him in the bullpen right now and he’s going to be dominant,” the ex-Yankees star said. “He can help the team right now as a bullpen guy, but I feel like watching him, I can see why they see the future for him as a starter.”
The stuff is different, and so is the ceiling
There is broad agreement inside and outside the organization that Lagrange is not simply Betances 2.0. He is a more complete pitcher. Betances relied primarily on a high-octane fastball and a knuckle curveball. Lagrange works a three-pitch mix: a fastball that has averaged 100.5 mph this spring, a sweeper with roughly 20 inches of horizontal break, and a changeup.
In 2025 at High-A and Double-A, Lagrange went 11-8 with a 3.53 ERA in 24 games. He struck out 168 batters in 120 innings. His walk rate, 62 free passes over that span, was the main red flag, and the Yankees know it.
Betances spoke to that challenge directly, noting that taller pitchers often require more time to synchronize their delivery. He spent years doing dry reps in front of mirrors, repeating his motion without a ball in hand, just to find consistency. Lagrange, he said, has already taken that step better than Betances ever did.
“He has a chance to be one of the best starters in the game if he can get ahead early and stay on the attack,” Betances said. “His fastball, arguably, right now is top-three in the game. His slider has 20 inches of horizontal movement. And what impressed me the most is the ability to change speeds.”
Giancarlo Stanton, who played alongside Betances in New York, sees a shared presence between the two men on the mound. But for Stanton, it is the mentality that sets Lagrange apart. “The presence, the confidence,” Stanton said.
Judge, who faced Lagrange in that opening live batting practice session and crushed a home run before getting punched out on the 102.6 mph heater, was asked afterward: starter or reliever? His answer was unambiguous.
“Starter, for sure,” Judge told Betances, according to the former All-Star’s recounting of that conversation.
The Joba concern and why it matters less now
Any time the Yankees move a hard-throwing young starter to the bullpen, the ghost of Joba Chamberlain rises from the Hudson River. That story did not end well. Chamberlain never found his footing as a starter and faded as a reliever.
Analysts tracking Lagrange note the landscape has changed. Chris Sale, Garrett Crochet, and Michael King all transitioned between roles at various stages before becoming elite starters. Development is no longer a straight line.
The Yankees would still prefer to keep Lagrange on a starting track and log meaningful innings at Triple-A this summer. But they are not pretending the bullpen option does not exist.
“If he throws the ball the way he threw it in his first outing in the minor leagues the first couple months, he’s gonna be knocking on the door,” Betances said. “So it’ll be interesting to see what they do with him, but he’s right there.”
At 7-2 and sitting atop the American League, the Yankees can afford patience. But the calendar moves fast in baseball. And somewhere in Scranton, a 22-year-old Dominican right-hander is throwing 101 mph in cold April weather, making the wait harder by the day.
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