SARASOTA, Fla. — The Yankees have spent the entire offseason hearing the same question. Can they really run it back? Can a roster built around returning players compete in a loaded American League East without a marquee free-agent splash?
On Friday afternoon at Ed Smith Stadium, a 22-year-old right-hander from Puerto Rico offered a different kind of answer. It came not from the checkbook but from the mound. And it arrived with six different pitch shapes, a sinker that touched 97 mph and three innings of shutdown work against a Baltimore Orioles lineup stacked with big league regulars.
Elmer Rodriguez started the Yankees’ Grapefruit League opener and made it look routine. But what the 22-year-old showed Friday was anything but ordinary. The question now is not whether Rodriguez belongs in the conversation for a big league role this season. It is how soon the conversation becomes unavoidable.
Rodriguez channels veteran poise in his first big league camp outing
Before taking the rubber, Rodriguez had spent the first week of camp observing the Yankees’ veteran arms. He watched how Max Fried carried himself between innings. He studied the body language of pitchers who have been through October baseball. He took mental notes on what composure looks like from 60 feet, 6 inches.
“Their presence on the mound, how calm they are, they take it one pitch at a time,” Rodriguez said. “I’m just trying to do the same. I feel like I did the same today.”
Then he went out and proved it.
Rodriguez retired the side in order during the first inning, getting Gunnar Henderson and Pete Alonso to roll over soft ground balls before striking out Orioles top prospect Samuel Basallo on an elevated fastball. The sinker touched 96.8 mph. The poise was palpable.
“First inning, the adrenaline was high in the moment,” Rodriguez said. “But I was able to channel it and use it to my advantage. I felt like I was executing well and felt good.”
Three scoreless innings against Baltimore’s near full-strength lineup
The Orioles did not send a soft lineup to Ed Smith Stadium on Friday. Henderson, Alonso, Tyler O’Neill, Heston Kjerstad and Adley Rutschman were all in the starting nine. Eight of the nine hitters projected to make Baltimore’s Opening Day roster according to FanGraphs’ Roster Resource. This was about as close to a real test as spring training allows.
Rodriguez navigated it with surgical precision. He scattered three singles across three frames, walked nobody and threw just 42 pitches. Seven of his nine outs came on ground balls. He posted a 70 percent ground-ball rate and held the Orioles to an 84.6 mph average exit velocity.
In the second inning, Kjerstad broke his bat on a grounder that turned into a double play to end the frame. The third inning brought the hardest contact of the day. Henderson lined a two-out single to center. Alonso then smashed what looked like a sure RBI double into the gap in left-center. But non-roster invitee Kenedy Corona, a former minor league Gold Glove winner, made a diving catch near the warning track to rob Alonso and preserve the zeros.
It was the kind of sequence that tells you a pitcher has the stuff to survive in the majors. The lineup adjusted. Rodriguez held.
Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake did not mince words.
“That was pleasantly surprising for Elmer, just because you never know what it’s going to look like the first time you get on the major league mound with a major league lineup up there,” Blake said. “That’s borderline their ‘A’ lineup there, minus one or two pieces. But to have some poise out there, to control the strike zone, to move some different shapes around and just see that his stuff’s going to play in the zone versus these types of hitters, that was really encouraging.”
Six pitches, one deep arsenal and a crafty approach
What separates Rodriguez from your typical hard-throwing prospect is the depth of his repertoire. He did not lean on one or two offerings Friday. He mixed six distinct pitches: a sinker that sat 94 to 97 mph, a four-seam fastball, a cutter, a changeup, a curveball and a slider.
That kind of variety at age 22 is rare. The cutter bridges the gap between his fastball shapes and his breaking stuff. The changeup and slider project as his go-to swing-and-miss weapons. And the curveball gives him a different look entirely when hitters start timing the hard stuff.
Blake described Rodriguez as having “a good, crafty arsenal” that he could use on all hitters.
Catcher Austin Wells was equally impressed.
“I thought he was great,” Wells said. “He mixed it really well, hit the spots when he needed to and got some big ground balls. He’s got a lot of really good pitches, got the talent and he’s just got to go do it.”
Rodriguez’s breakout 2025 set the stage for this moment
Friday did not happen in a vacuum. Rodriguez arrived at camp as MLB Pipeline’s No. 82 overall prospect and Baseball America’s Yankees Minor League Player of the Year for 2025. He was acquired from the Red Sox in December 2024 in exchange for catcher Carlos Narvaez. It has turned into one of the shrewdest trades of Brian Cashman’s tenure.
Last season, Rodriguez posted a 2.58 ERA across three minor league levels. He made 26 starts between High-A Hudson Valley, Double-A Somerset and Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre. He struck out 176 batters in 150 innings, the second-most punchouts in all of minor league baseball. He walked 57 and allowed 104 hits. He entered the year with a goal of surpassing 100 innings and wound up blowing past that mark by 50.
“Getting past that and finishing the year strong, ending it healthy, that’s something I’m trying to learn from and continue to take it from year to year,” Rodriguez said.
He and fellow Yankees pitching prospect Carlos Lagrange, who starts Saturday’s home opener against the Tigers, are considered the top two arms in the organization’s farm system. Rodriguez is viewed as the higher-floor option as a starter. Lagrange may carry the higher ceiling. Both are pushing hard.
“They’re obviously pushing their way up the ladder,” general manager Brian Cashman said in late January.
Boone sees a starter with staying power in the Bronx
Rodriguez will likely begin the 2026 season at Triple-A. He has just one start at that level. The Yankees want more seasoning before calling him to the Bronx. But Friday moved the needle.
Manager Aaron Boone liked everything he saw.
“Very much under control,” Boone said. “Obviously running up against a pretty real lineup there. The poise that we continue to see is something you like, even though it’s not that big a deal, but first time in a big league spring training game, kicking off the spring, handled it well.”
Then Boone went a step further.
“I really think he’s got a bright future,” Boone added. “So he’s going to get some run down here.”
Before that future unfolds in pinstripes, Rodriguez has another stage to command. He is set to depart March 1 to represent Puerto Rico in the World Baseball Classic, where he will serve in a starting role. Pool play begins March 4 in Tokyo, but Puerto Rico hosts its own pool round, meaning Rodriguez gets to pitch in his native country on a global stage.
“I feel like it’s probably going to be higher-intensity games,” Rodriguez said. “Everybody says it’s like playing in the playoffs.”
If Friday was any indication, Rodriguez is ready for that kind of pressure. The Yankees’ rotation already features Max Fried, Cam Schlittler, Will Warren, Ryan Weathers and Luis Gil to start the season. Gerrit Cole and Carlos Rodon are expected to rejoin the staff by May and June. The depth is stacking up. And Rodriguez just made himself impossible to ignore.
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