Severino working back to the Bronx
By Roberto Salvador Klapisch
It was a simple, no-frills game of catch, meaning no television cameras, no reporters, no social media, just a spring training exercise in its simplest form: toss the ball 25 times from 40 feet with a zero degree of difficulty.
In any other setting these few minutes would’ve been swallowed up by more pressing business in Yankees camp, but this was no ordinary afternoon at Steinbrenner Field in Tampa, Fla. Not when Luis Severino was testing his arm for the first time in weeks. All that mattered was finding out why the young right-hander had to be shut down after experiencing inflammation near the rotator cuff.
So there they were – manager Aaron Boone, general manager Brian Cashman, coaches and medical staff – watching intently as Severino sought the answer to the franchise’s most burning question: was the Bombers’ ace finally on the mend or is he doomed to nagging injuries that will sabotage the season?
This is no small matter, as Severino is likely to be on the disabled list for at least a month. May 1 is the scheduled return date, but even that’s a best-case scenario. It’s a scary thought, given that the Dominican native still stands at the top of the rotation.
Headliner
When healthy, Severino is the Yankees’ hardest throwing starter, the one most capable of dominating opposing hitters, and their best weapon in a Game 7 setting in October. CC Sabathia has had a longer, more successful career. Masahiro Tanaka might be a better finesse artist. And newcomer James Paxton lends stability and maturity to the alignment.
But it’s Severino and that 98-mph fastball that’s supposed to send a message of the Bombers’ emergence in the American League East, if not the rest of the league. All winter the front office projected multiple paths toward dethroning the Red Sox, but one of those coefficients never changed.
It was Severino acting as the tip of the spear, matching Boston’s Chris Sale or David Price when it mattered most.
It was a lot to ask of any 25-year-old, but Severino is no ordinary kid. He is in his fifth full season in the big leagues. To ask opposing hitters what it’s like to face him is to evoke a helpless shrug.
Severino doesn’t just throw hard. On his best days he demoralizes lineups. The 1-2 punch of that four-seam fastball and late-breaking slider is a primal challenge pitting arm-speed versus bat-speed from 60 feet, six inches.
If you step to the plate feeling sluggish or unsure or otherwise a tick behind, the battle with Severino is already over.
That was the calculus through the better part of 2017, when he was a 14-game winner, and the first half of 2018, when Severino was 14-2 with a 2.31 ERA. This was the coronation the Bombers had been waiting for ever since he arrived on the scene in 2015. And even then, as a 21-year-old, Severino gave off the vibe of someone much older and more experienced.
“Seve has always known he’s got a gift, and he carries himself that way,” catcher Austin Romine said. “You can sense that as a teammate, not just when he’s on the mound but in the clubhouse, too.”
The fact that he is fully bilingual adds to his standing among the Yankees, particularly the Spanish speakers. Severino, a product of the organization’s player development program in Tampa, where English is taught to foreign players, was quick to pick up English. He was unafraid to make mistakes as he mastered baseball terms and phrases with his American teammates.
The lessons centered on episodes of the ’90s TV hit “Friends” – a critical learning tool, given the show’s relatively simple, accent-free dialogue. Unlike other prospects who participated in the classes only because of the team’s mandate, Severino poured himself into the goal of becoming articulate among Americans.
“It was important for me to learn English because it allowed to me communicate with everyone on my team,” he said last summer. “It also showed the fans that I was trying.”
Trending Up
The overall trend line was breathtaking: Severino had youth, maturity, cultural awareness and that to-die-arm arsenal as the Yankees were heading into the home stretch in 2018. Then, suddenly, it all fell apart: Severino’s four-seamer took on the attributes of a beach ball, although, ironically, there was no measurable drop in his velocity.
Hitters nevertheless reacted as if they knew what was coming, which may have been the case. One theory is that Severino rested his hands from the set position in different places: closer to the chest for the fastball, nearer to the belt for the slider. Another possibility was a distinctly slower and more deliberate delivery that tipped off the breaking pitch. And who knows, opponents might’ve picked up clues from Severino’s hand movement inside the glove as he adjusted his grip.
Either way, regardless of the explanation, the results were disastrous. Severino was 5-6 with a 5.57 ERA after the All-Star break and was roughed up badly in Game 3 of the AL Division Series against the Red Sox. With the series tied at one game apiece, Boston lit up Severino for six runs in three innings on the way to a 16-1 wipeout. The Yankees never recovered, eliminated the next night.
It was a humbling end, not just for the Bombers but for Severino, who admitted, “I don’t know what went wrong.” He promised the Yankees family there’d be a newer, wiser version of his former self in spring training, cleaning up his mechanical flaws, eliminating the pitch-tipping, bundling it with a new awareness of his responsibility as the ace.
But then came the strange twinges in his shoulder after just two weeks in camp, the sudden deadness in his fastball and, with it, the questions that now hang over both the Yankees and Severino like an anvil: just how much can they depend on their flamethrower in 2019?
No one could answer that in March, but this much was certain: without Severino every fifth day the Yankees’ path to October becomes far more difficult.
Featured Image: Michael Zagaris / Getty Images Sport