Yankees Having Success Rejuvenating Pitcher Dillon Tate

The New York Yankees have reportedly restored 2015 first rounder Dillon Tate‘s velocity back to the upper-90’s following his early season struggles.

Yankees general manager Brian Cashman knew he was getting a potential steal in starting pitcher Dillon Tate at the trade deadline if only his coaching staff could figure out the reasons for his puzzling drop in velocity.

Acquiring the fourth overall pick in the 2015 draft, a 22-year-old pitcher with legitimate front-of-the-rotation potential, for a 39-year-old designated hitter with two months remaining on his contract was a no-brainer. And Tate was just one of three arms the Yankees landed for Carlos Beltran.

While he was rated the 36th overall prospect in baseball before 2016, the reason he was available at the deadline was a disastrous first half with Texas’s Sally League affiliate. Tate pitched to a 5.12 ERA and 4.37 FIP  in 65 innings with the Hickory Crawdads before the trade. He was striking out only 19% of the batters he’s faced and walking 9.3%.

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Tate has been working out of the bullpen since coming over to the Yankees. It’s not clear whether that is potentially a permanent switch, although Cashman told reporters at the time it was in order to have more control over his outings.

Jon Heyman of Today’s Knuckleball reports that some within Yankees organization see Tate as a potential closer or late-inning arm down the road. Obviously he would have more value if he were able to stick as a starting pitcher, but they may believe he would have trouble maintaining his velocity.

Tate was regularly throwing the low-90’s and even high 80’s in the first half with Texas, which was a big reason for his disappointing performance. Heyman cites sources close to the young righthander who believed the Rangers workout regimen was to blame for his velocity drop. Tate had regularly touched 100 with his heater as a college starter with UC-Santa Barbara.

Brendan Kuty of NJ Advanced Media had some encouraging news for Yankees fans Wednesday, as he spoke to a talent evaluator who saw Tate with Low-A Charleston recently who said his fastball was now reaching 96 with his four seamer. He did however note that the offering was still inconsistent. 

The Yankees have Tate working closely with minor league pitching coordinator Danny Borrell who has made some mechanical changes to his delivery. There is still a ways to go, but there are already signs of improvement. Tate’s most recent outing was two scoreless innings for Low-A Charleston against his old club the Crawdads.

Tate is currently only ranked 11th in the New York system by MLB Pipeline, but make no mistake, he is an elite talent who has the ability to be the team’s top prospect by this time next year if they can get him right.