Yankees starter Luis Severino feeling good has fans feeling even better
New York Yankees starting pitcher Luis Severino walks to the dugout after being taken out of the game during the fourth inning against the Boston Red Sox in an MLB baseball game at Yankee Stadium on Saturday, April 9, 2022. Credit: Kathleen Malone-Van Dyke
There’s been a sort of longing in the air at Yankee Stadium. It was there on Opening Day on Friday when, with Gerrit Cole struggling, a fan screamed “We want Sevy!” It was there about 15 minutes before first pitch a day later, when Luis Severino jogged onto the field, the still-sparse crowd cheering him like a gathering twice its size.
And it carried on past the first at-bat, the one in which he coaxed Kiké Hernandez into a groundout on a 98.1- mph fastball.
Was Severino’s start sterling? No. But did it hold promise for a fan base — and a team — that has so desperately missed the way he can electrify a rotation? Absolutely.
And for those who watched Severino’s star dimmed by injury after injury, including Tommy John surgery, Saturday’s start provided plenty of hope that his fate won’t be that of the countless players who came before him — athletes who burn bright and burn out when their health can’t live up to their talent.
The shortened spring training meant Severino wasn’t fully built up, but he pitched three innings plus one batter, allowing two runs, five hits and no walks with five strikeouts and one home run. He was hurt by two defensive miscues — one of which put a runner on base for Alex Verdugo’s two-run homer in the second — but the stuff, that old Severino stuff, was there.
His four-seam fastball topped out at 100.3 mph and the control that sometimes eluded him in spring training was back in check, as he threw 41 of his 65 pitches for strikes. Thirty-five of his pitches were fastballs, and they averaged 97.8 mph (in his 2017 and 2018 All-Star years, his fastball averaged 97.6).
Look, it’s Game 2 of 162. There are plenty of things that can go wrong. But what’s opening weekend if not a time for optimism?
So let’s lean in: If Severino stays healthy and stays the course, he and Cole could be among the best, if not the best, one-two punches in the American League.
And suddenly the Yankees aren’t just a team that’s projected to be just a little worse than the Blue Jays but a very strong contender for favorite in the AL East. (How’s that for optimism?)
“I feel pretty good,” Severino said. “I’ll see how I wake up tomorrow, but as of right now, I feel pretty great. I saw the velocity was really good. I wasn’t expecting it to be that high.”
And there’s something to that. This may not just be a return of the Severino of old, but an opportunity to have a better Severino.
At 28, he’s all grown up, having dealt with more career adversity than many. And he’s hungry. Pitching only 18 innings the previous three years will do that to a guy.
Have the last few years changed Severino? “I think a lot,” Aaron Boone said. “I think we’ve seen him mature as a professional, as a man. I think there’s the — and not that it was a problem for him, I don’t mean to say that — but I feel like you can tell from his offseason routine now, the seriousness with which he takes [it], the way he eats and his diet and everything. That’s apparent. So I think he’s continued to just really mature in a good way and as a pro.”
In addition to plain old competitive spirit, there also are 15 million other reasons motivating Severino. He’s got a $15 million option for 2023, and he wants to give the Yankees every reason to activate it.
In spring training, he told reporters the goal was to be a Yankee for the rest of his career, and who can blame him? He started with the organization when he was 17; it’s all he knows and all he wants to know.
Of course, beginnings aren’t everything. Baseball is famously unpredictable, and he could struggle plenty this year. But beginnings aren’t useless, either.
“Sometimes when you get off on a little bit of a slow start, that can weigh on you because that’s all you have to go on,” Boone said. “You want to see guys get some things out of the way.”
On Saturday, Severino accomplished that mission — one more than three years in the making — and left fans longing for more.
Laura Albanese is the Mets beat writer for Newsday. She's been covering MLB since 2014 after starting at Newsday as an intern seven years earlier.
