Luis Gil's demotion comes with the craziest Yankees stat you might ever see

Luis Gil's time in the New York Yankees' starting rotation didn't last long. After a dismal performance that included six earned runs and zero strikeouts over four innings against the Houston Astros, the club had seen enough and sent him back to Scranton. All the goodwill from his dominant performance against the Boston Red Sox had vanished.

The underlying metrics show that Gil's start against Boston was driven by luck (and the Red Sox lineup's ineptitude) over any sort of skill from Gil. His fastball velo was down, he managed just three whiffs, and it was a continuation of what has plagued him since last season.

Now with four starts and a 6.05 ERA on the books, a surprising stat has emerged proving that Gil's performance so far actually should have been far worse, as unbelievable as that sounds.

Gil's .161 BABIP stands out like a sore thumb next to his 6.05 ERA, and it proves he somehow got incredibly lucky not to own a 15.00 ERA. Pitchers can influence batting average on balls in play, but only to a degree. Typically, the average sits around .300, with the guys who excel at limiting hard contact coming in a shade lower and those who don't coming in a shade higher.

Don't expect to see Luis Gil back with the Yankees anytime soon

The reason to be concerned by that BABIP, despite it being artificially low, is that Gil's underlying metrics paint a picture of a guy who will give up a lot of hits. He's allowed an average exit velocity of 92.7 miles per hour through his four starts, which is a fifth percentile mark. The 47.8% hard-hit rate he's permitted isn't much better, coming in the 16th percentile.

Throw in the walks, which come in at a 12.3% clip, and you've got a recipe for an even bigger disaster than he's already been. So much for the Yankees reinventing his mechanics.

Even when his overall line was good during his start in Boston, he may have only allowed two hits, but he gave up an average exit velocity of 91.7 miles per hour, proving that he got lucky that a lot of those balls were hit towards his fielders.

The point is that the 2024 AL Rookie of the Year is incredibly broken at this point. Whether or not he's salvageable remains to be seen. Gil has the right attitude, but his promise to see us soon isn't likely.

Some believed over the offseason that he would perform better coming out of the bullpen, but that too seems unlikely. Yes, the walks could be mitigated somewhat in a relief role, but typically, guys who find success in this sort of transition are real strikeout artists.

That's another area where Gil is woefully subpar. He's managed just nine strikeouts against his 11 walks. More importantly, his 21.9% whiff rate and 22.1% chase rate prove he isn't fooling anyone. Those might go up a bit if he only had to air it out for an inning, but not to the degree needed to find success.

We're at the point where the 28-year-old has to be built back from the ground up, and even then there's no guarantee that New York can put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Fortunately, Carlos Rodón will be back soon, and Gerrit Cole hopefully will return shortly after. The Yankees also have a red-hot Elmer Rodriguez waiting in the wings and Carlos Lagrange lurking. They won't need Gil for a while, and that's for the best, because what he really needs is time.

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