One of the joys of this here daily birthday series is that we get to see nearly every corner of the Yankees’ history. Yesterday’s entry featured the incomparable Derek Jeter, a 14-time All-Star and 5-time World Series winner, while today’s will see a 2022 fifth round draft pick, who has yet to surface in the Major Leagues, and has only recently spent time in triple-A.
Regardless, although it is a professional baseball career that has hardly begun, Eric Reyzelman’s will be under the microscope today.
With nary a single Yankee player being born on June 27th, it is the 25-year-old’s day in the light.
Eric Reyzelman
Born: June 27, 2001 (San Ramon, CA)
Yankees Tenure: 2022-Present (minors)
Born in 2001 in San Ramon, California, on the eastern outskirts of the Bay Area, Reyzelman grew up a Giants fan, and did not go without adversity early in his playing days. Despite being drafted by the Yankees, and seeing minor league success to this point, Reyzelman was actually cut from his high school baseball team. Forced to take a non-traditional route to professional baseball, the right-hander did not let a little adversity stop him from succeeding.
Reyzelman actually committed to playing baseball at the Division-I level in college, before he played on his JV or Varsity squad. With travel ball being his avenue, his talents drew plenty of interest despite not playing for his school. The interest was strong enough, evidently, for the Yankees to draft Reyzelman in the fifth round out of LSU.
In the same year he was drafted, the right-handed hurler began his professional career in the Yankees organization. It was a brief stint, as he tossed just four combined innings between A-ball and Rookie ball, and he barely pitched in 2023 as well, as a cyst on his back the required multiple operations kept him off the mound.
Reyzelman finally got a more substantial opportunity in 2024, and did not waste his time on the mound. In 38.2 total innings between Rookie ball, high-A, and double-A, the righty broke out with a sparkling 1.16 ERA. It was no fluke either, as he struck out a whopping 63 batters in that span, good for a 40.9 percent clip.
The success earned him a full season with Triple-A Scranton-Wilkes Barre in 2025 as he pitched exclusively at that level, tossing 42 mostly effective innings that season. He didn’t quite reach the same level of effectiveness that he did in 2024, as he managed an ERA well above 4 and his strikeout rate was nearly cut in half.
In 2026, Reyzelman has once again split time between Double-A and Triple-A, as he’s pitched 24.1 innings to this point, and has likely ran into some tough luck with a 5.55 ERA and a mismatched 3.07 FIP on the year. His pitch-mix has evolved significantly since he left college with a profile very heavy on the fastball, adding in a slider and a changeup which have varying returns in the command department.
Now in his age-25 season, Reyzelman has shown flashes of highly effective relief pitching, though his overall production, not to mention his health, have been inconsistent over the course of his professional career. He has ascended to the highest reaches of the minor leagues, and his arrival in the big league bullpen may be a matter of time. Despite any concerns, he clearly has some talent that could do damage in the right hands, and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him racking up Ks out of the ‘pen in the future.
In the meantime, we wish him a happy 25th birthday!
See more of the “Yankees Birthday of the Day” series here.
