Why Carlos LaGrange following the Dellin Betances path still makes sense for Yankees

The surface-level stat line on Carlos LaGrange through his first five Triple-A starts isn't going to make anyone panic or jump for joy: 4.12 ERA, some walk issues, limited innings. If that's where you stop reading, though, you'll miss the actual story.

Because when you dig underneath that ERA and look at what LaGrange is actually doing on the mound at 22 years old in Triple-A, you start to see something Yankees fans have watched pay off before. Something that looks a lot like the early innings of a Dellin Betances story — before anyone realized that's what it was.

Carlos Lagrange's fastball is different as Yankees ascension continues

Let's start with the number that jumps out the most: velocity. In his April 11 start against the Durham Bulls, LaGrange averaged 100.5 mph on his four-seamer and 100.2 mph on his sinker — both pitches averaging triple digits. Of his 43 total fastballs that night, 27 were at or above 100 mph. Nine of them hit 102.

For context, consider where the two best pitchers in baseball currently sit. Paul Skenes — the consensus top starter in the game — averages 97.3 mph on his four-seamer with 2,324 RPM of spin. Mason Miller, the most dominant closer in baseball, averages 101.4 mph and tops out at 103.4 mph with 2,542 RPM. LaGrange, at 22 years old in Triple-A, is sitting in that same velocity band as Miller.

And according to Prospect Savant's Stuff+ model — which grades each pitch on its likelihood of producing a whiff compared to similarly thrown pitches — LaGrange's arsenal is legitimately elite across the board. His sinker grades at 122, his sweeper at 117, his changeup at 116, his four-seamer at 110, and his slider at 106. Every single pitch above 100 means above average at missing bats. That's not one plus offering. That's a five-pitch arsenal where the worst grade is still above average.

The plane this creates out of that 6-foot-7 frame makes it play even harder. The downhill angle means a 99 mph fastball doesn't arrive where a hitter's eyes told them it would. Aaron Boone flagged it directly this spring: "The thing I've been pleased with with Carlos is, obviously, the stuff jumps out at you."

That's an understatement.

The Stuff Backs Up the Hype

The Prospect Savant percentile data tells a nuanced story — and the nuance is what makes this interesting. LaGrange's overall PS Score sits at 92.56, putting him in the 92nd percentile among all Triple-A pitchers. His Whiff% comes in at the 71st percentile (31.9%), and his Z-Contact% at the 89th percentile — meaning hitters make contact on only 72.37% of pitches in the strike zone against him. That last number is exceptional. When LaGrange throws a strike, the swing-and-miss threat is real on every pitch.

However, the honest weak spots are equally visible. His BB% sits at the 32nd percentile (14.8%), and his Hard-Hit% at just the 12th (51.4% hard contact allowed). Those aren't hidden — and there is no need to to try to hide them. But they're also exactly what you'd expect from a 22-year-old power arm still learning to repeat a 6-foot-7 delivery. The underlying stuff grades say those will improve. The contact quality numbers say they haven't yet.

Why the Starting Rotation Isn't the Path — And That's Fine

Here's the honest roster context: the Yankees don't need LaGrange in the rotation, and likely won't for a while. Gerrit Cole is working back from Tommy John surgery and is expected to return to the big-league club. Carlos Rodón, who went 18-7 with a 3.09 ERA in 2025, is already slated to rejoin the rotation. Clarke Schmidt is expected back from elbow surgery by the end of the campaign. Max Fried anchors the staff daily. That's four legitimate top-of-rotation arms before you even get to Luis Gil, Ryan Weathers, Cam Schlittler, and Will Warren, who all have proven they are big league arms.

A 22-year-old with command questions has no lane in that starting group in 2026. But the bullpen? That's a completely different conversation.

The Betances Blueprint Already Exists in This Organization

The bullpen is currently dealing with early-season turbulence. Camilo Doval has struggled to a 6.97 ERA. David Bednar's peripherals are elite but the surface results have been uneven. The Yankees need high-leverage, high-strikeout arms — and they've historically known exactly what to do with a power pitcher whose starting path has command questions.

Dellin Betances was a struggling starter at Triple-A Scranton — the same minor league affiliate LaGrange currently calls home — when the Yankees moved him to the bullpen in May 2013. Command was the problem, same as LaGrange. The Yankees sharpened the focus to two pitches, shortened the delivery window, and watched him strike out 83 batters in 60 innings at Triple-A before the call-up. By 2014, he was the best reliever in baseball: 1.40 ERA, 135 strikeouts, a 274 ERA+.

ESPN's Jeff Passan put it plainly this spring: "Until he's summoned to the big leagues, Lagrange will start games, but if he arrives this year, he could join David Bednar and Camilo Doval to form Nasty Boys 2.0, a bullpen defined by extreme levels of velocity."

What to Watch

The ERA will iron itself out or it won't. That's not the story. The story is a 22-year-old from Bayaguana, Dominican Republic, who only signed for $10,000, sitting in Triple-A with a five-pitch arsenal where every offering grades above average at missing bats. He sports a 92nd-percentile PS Score and elite velocity that belongs in the same sentence as the best closer in baseball.

LaGrange finished 2025 with 168 strikeouts in 120 innings — third-most in all of minor league baseball. The big league stuff is not the question. The only question is what role unlocks it fastest for a Yankees team that may need a high-leverage weapon sooner than 2027.

When a manager calls to the bullpen, he wants to make sure he has true swing and miss options for the biggest moments of the game, and LaGrange gives Aaron Boone that option, but Boone also needs to know he can fill up the zone. If the command comes, you're looking at a mid-to top-end rotation starter. If the Yankees tap the Betances blueprint, you might be looking at the most electric reliever in their system debuting before we get to summer.

Either way, numbers are just noise. The development and the stuff are the story.

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