Yankees minor league baseball is back! While the big league club worked on sweeping the San Francisco Giants out west, the first games of the minor league season took place over the weekend, with Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre opening their season on Friday.
They only played three games, and the other three full-season affiliates don’t officially kick off until Friday, but we did get some notable performances and interesting storylines from the first few games of the year from the farm’s top affiliate.
Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders
Record: 2-1, 1 GB in International League East after a 2-1 week against the Buffalo Bison (Blue Jays)
Run differential: +5
Coming up: Away @ Rochester Red Wings (Nationals)
It was a choppy start to the season for the RailRiders, who opened the season on Friday before the cold Buffalo weather forced a Saturday postponement, leading to a Sunday doubleheader.
Debuting one of the best Triple-A rosters you can put together, they put on a show on Friday afternoon, riding five sharp innings from Brendan Beck to an 8-0 shutout victory. Eight of their nine starters got a hit, and the first seven batters all recorded an RBI, with Spencer Jones hitting a double and Yanquiel Fernandez mashing a home run.
The opener of Sunday’s doubleheader was a whirlwind. Scranton took an early lead and rode a solid start from Carlos Lagrange, but was dragged into a 3-3 tie heading into extras (minor league doubleheaders are only seven innings). RBI knocks from Jasson Domínguez and Max Schuemann were just enough to win the game in 10 innings, 5-4, with flamethrower Yovanny Cruz getting a win in his Triple-A debut and Danny Watson picking up his first Triple-A save.
The nightcap was a bit rougher. Jones and Fernandez both launched home runs to get the RailRiders out to an early lead, but Dom Hamel struggled badly with his command in his organizational debut, allowing a six-run fourth inning en route to a 7-3 loss.
It was a strong weekend for the two hitters we all have the most eyes on in Domínguez and Jones, with other notable performers including the veterans on minor league deals. Beck and Lagrange looked good in their season debuts, with Lagrange managing to still hit 101.3 on the radar gun on a frigid day in Buffalo. Much of the bullpen also thrived, with notable names like Cruz, Harrison Cohen, and Kervin Castro delivering scoreless relief along with two guys who we’ll see in the Bronx soon when the inevitable bullpen shakeup occurs (Yerry De los Santos, Angel Chivilli).
It was not a great defensive weekend, as Scranton committed six errors in three games. One of them was particularly bad from Domínguez in left field.
Players of Note:
Spencer Jones: 4-for-12, HR, 3 RBI, 2B, BB, 5 K
Jasson Domínguez: 4-for-13, 3 RBI, R, 2 K
Ernesto Martinez Jr.: 4-for-11, RBI, 3B, 2B, 2 K, SB
Carlos Lagrange: 4 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 0 BB, 3 K
Prospect of the Week: Brendan Beck
Weekly Stats: 5 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 9 K, 18 whiffs
In a stacked rotation that includes a former Rookie of the Year and two Top 100 prospects, a name that may fall behind is Brendan Beck, a former third-round pick who’s battled injuries that cost him most of the first three seasons of his professional career before finally putting together a full season in 2025.
Beck got off to a fantastic start in Double-A Somerset that year and earned a summer promotion to Triple-A, where he struggled with inconsistency. His low-90s fastball wasn’t playing as well and, despite his positioning in the organization, he was left unprotected in the Rule 5 draft. After going undrafted, he came to camp as a non-roster invite while also getting the chance to pitch with his brother, Tristan, for Great Britain in the World Baseball Classic.
With that experience behind him, he’s opened 2026 with a bang, dominating Buffalo with one of the better outings of his professional career. While that low-90s fastball was his most-utilized pitch, he located it well and earned a called strike + whiff rate (CSW%) of 43 percent. His best pitch was his slider, and it wasn’t close, wiping out several hitters by generating nine whiffs on just 15 swings. He also mixed in a splitter and curveball, both generating positive readings. The splitter, especially, seems revamped from 2025.
Beck profiles as a back-end starter or long reliever when he reaches the majors, and the more starts like these that the 27-year-old gets under his belt, the quicker that day will come, whether it’s for the Yankees or for someone else.
