The New York Yankees lost their second consecutive game against the Minnesota Twins on Friday night, despite holding a late lead courtesy of several solo homers. However, the pitching couldn’t get it done, specifically Clay Holmes, who gave up a double to right field off the bat of Carlos Correa, who’s been electric to start the series against the Bombers.
The Yankees may need to think about changing that closer since Holmes has been unreliable lately, but the team was forced into changing their bullpen situation after Jhony Brito’s tough performance on Thursday.
After Brito was knocked out before the first inning even came to a close, the team looked to Colten Brewer to help get them out of the situation. Brewer immediately gave up two homers, but he had solid stuff after spending spring training with the Tampa Bay Rays.
The Yankees called up a promising relief pitcher in Greg Weissert:
After the Yankees announced they DFAd Brewer on Friday afternoon, they announced Greg Weissert’s promotion, one of their young relief pitchers with a ton of promise.
At 28 years old, Weissert has top-graded pitches across-the-board and can make a significant impact for the Yankees if he can find a bit of confidence. Over 11.1 innings in 2022 at the MLB level, Weissert posted a 5.56 ERA, 40% ground ball rate, 51.7% left-on-base rate, and 8.74 strikeouts per nine. He had a big issue allowing walks, posting 3.97 per nine, which was prevalent throughout his minor-league tenure.
Nonetheless, Weissert has started the 2023 season off on a hot note with Triple-A Scranton. He hosts a 1.69 ERA across 5.1 innings with 11.91 strikeouts per nine and a 100% left-on-base rate. Weissert is a flyball pitcher, averaging a 43.3% flyball rate with a career 7.7% HR/FB ratio. The reality is flyballs can be dangerous in Yankee Stadium, so he needs to be careful if he wants to survive at the next level. He did record a 48.8% ground ball rate in Triple-A back in 2021, suggesting he can keep the ball on the ground, especially with the usage of his sinker, which he tossed about 38% of the time, based on last year’s sample size.
Weissert also has a sweeping slider, four-seam fastball, and change-up in his arsenal. His sinker generated a .300 batting average against last year but his sweeper a .130 average with six strikeouts and a 21.6% whiff rate.
Luckily for the Bombers, Nestor Cortés managed to pitch 7.0 innings of excellent ball on Friday, keeping the bullpen relatively healthy. This suggests they were able to rest most of their relief pitchers, so they should be ready to rock on Saturday with the Yankees looking to pick up their first win of the series.