FORT MYERS, Fla. — Some pitchers, like Luis Gil, build their velocity up incrementally over the course of the spring.
Others, like Carlos Lagrange, come out firing and do not let up — at least not yet for the Yankees’ top pitching prospect.
Lagrange continued to dazzle in his second Grapefruit League outing Friday, piggybacking Gil and tossing three shutout innings against a Twins lineup filled with mostly regulars while averaging 100.1 mph on his fastball.
The 22-year-old generated some ugly looking swings (or check swings) from the Twins, racking up nine whiffs and four strikeouts on 41 pitches before having to go to the bullpen to throw more because he was so efficient.
“The thing I’ve been pleased with with Carlos is, obviously, the stuff jumps out at you, the big fastball and the slider/changeup are really good pitches for him, but the strike throwing’s been there,” manager Aaron Boone said after a 17-5 win at Hammond Stadium.
“If he’s doing that, it gets exciting.”
The biggest knock on Lagrange during his rise through the minors has been a lack of command, which is why some scouts believe he will end up in the bullpen. But the Yankees can also dream about what his high-level stuff — he topped out at 102.1 mph Friday and has thrown the three hardest pitches of any pitcher this spring — might look like over longer outings as a starter if he is able to pound the strike zone more consistently, as he did Friday.
Also encouraging is how Lagrange has maintained his velocity through outings.
His fastball averaged 100.2 mph in his first inning, 99.3 in the second and 100.8 in the third.
Gil, meanwhile, had more of a grind, throwing 52 pitches across 2 ¹/₃ innings.
He got stuck in some long at-bats that drove up his pitch count —four that lasted seven pitches or longer — that forced him to exit with two outs in the second before he re-entered to get two quick outs on two pitches in the third inning.
Those two pitches were Gil’s hardest of the day, at 96.5 mph and 96.7 mph, though his four-seamer averaged 94.7 — a slight tick up from his spring debut (94.5) but still below his 2025 average (95.3) and the 96.6 he averaged as the AL Rookie of the Year in 2024.
In the first inning, he left a 94.5 mph fastball down the middle to Trevor Larnach, who drilled it for a home run.
“I think it’s the building process of spring training,” Gil said through an interpreter. “The training has been very good. We’re building on every single outing. I think we’ve had a consistent climb to get to the velo I’m used to. I think maybe by the third or fourth start, it might be more consistent to what I’m used to.”
Boone believes that if Gil — who only induced four swing-and-misses and one strikeout Friday — keeps building with each outing, he will ultimately get to where he needs to be.
“Part of that is just being really comfortable with his mechanics and his throwing motion to where he’s behind the ball and driving it,” Boone said. “We’ve seen when that velocity starts to climb, coupled with the secondary, then the swing-and-miss comes right back.”
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
