The New York Yankees are done adding new starting pitchers this offseason, according to MLB.com insider Mark Feinsand. If Feinsand is correct, none of the remaining free agent starters — Framber Valdez, Zac Gallen, Chris Bassitt or Lucas Giolito — will be joining the Yankees. But that doesn’t mean that general manager Brian Cashman won’t be looking for creative ways to upgrade the Bronx Bombers’ mound depth.
And that is exactly what he did with a very quiet signing last Saturday.
According to the Yankees’ official MLB transaction ledger, on January 17, the Yankees signed free agent right-hander Dylan Coleman to a minor league contract. According to Everything Yankees, the contract also comes with an invitation to Yankees spring training in Tampa, Florida.
Coleman has not pitched in the Major Leagues since throwing one inning in one game for the Houston Astros in 2024. But the 2018 fourth-round San Diego Padres draft pick by 2022, and after the Padres traded him away, rose to become the No. 19 prospect in the Kansas City Royals farm system, according to Baseball America rankings.
By that time, Coleman was throwing a four-seam fastball that regularly sat between 97 and 100 mph, and was clocked as high as 102 mph, according to a scouting report by MLB Pipeline.
What Happened to Coleman?
The most solid stretch of Coleman’s career came in 2022 with the Royals, when the Missouri State product appeared in 68 games, throwing 68 innings and striking out 71, all in relief, with an ERA of 2.78 and a FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) number of 3.88. He did walk 37, however.
But for reasons that remain somewhat unclear, Coleman’s performance fell off the table in 2023, as he threw just 18 1/3 innings for Kansas City with a bloated ERA of 8.84, prompting the Royals to unload him onto the Astros after the season, in a minor trade for righty pitcher Carlos Mateo.
“If anyone could fix him, though, it was the Astros and their Brent Strom-inspired pitching lab,” wrote Adam Weinrib of Yanks Go Yard on Thursday. “Bizarrely, they got just about the least out of him that any team plausibly could; he threw just a single inning with the big club (of the shutout variety), pairing it with an unsightly 6.50 ERA in 36 games at Triple-A Sugar Land.”
Possible Role With Yankees in 2026
According to a Baseball America scouting report, “Coleman began to rediscover his velocity and the bite on his slider while pitching in a semi-pro league in Missouri before joining the Royals. His fastball, which had dropped to the upper 80s by the end of his Padres tenure, sat at 98 mph in his brief big league showing and touched as high as 101 mph in 2021.”
“His repertoire creates a powerful one-two punch out of the bullpen and the ability to generate swings and misses in bunches,” the scouting report continued.
How much does Coleman have left? That’s what the Yankees will be looking to find out, to see if they have made a bargain basement upgrade to their bullpen, or simply taken a flyer that crash lands.
“It wasn’t long ago that Houston saw a spark, though, and the Yankees will now get a delayed chance to pick up where they left off,” wrote Weinrib. “It’s certainly not like the Yanks’ bullpen is otherwise settled. The door is swinging open.”
Yankees Very Quietly Add 102-mph Reliever Amid Bullpen Shakeup