Our ongoing birthday series here at PSA gives us the full range of the Yankees’ rich history, which includes both the likes of Lou Gehrig and Miguel Andujar. Today’s edition features a former Bomber more akin to the latter, as disappointment is the strongest association with Frankie Montas for Yankees fans.
The big right-hander has been a very good major league pitcher at times in his career, which is obviously the reason the Yankees acquired him in a fairly exciting trade in the middle of the 2022
season. New York, unfortunately, never got that version of Montas in pinstripes, nor did they really get any version of him for much of his ultimately brief tenure.
Frankie Montas
Born: March 21, 1993 (Sainagua, Dominican Republic)
Yankees Tenure: 2022-23
Signed out of the Dominican Republic at 16 years old, Frankie Montas made his Major League debut with a cup of coffee for the White Sox in 2015, though he wouldn’t stick around in the bigs until 2017. Before then, he also found himself a part of multiple high-level trades. First, he arrived in Chicago in the deal that sent Jake Peavy to the Red Sox, before heading to Oakland thanks to the deal that made Todd Frazier a member of the White Sox. Oakland was where the talented righty would finally stick.
In that 2017 season, he was not very good in a bullpen role, sporting an ERA over seven in 32 innings of work. In the following year, Montas was moved into the rotation for 11 starts, and made impressive strides, foreshadowing the breakout that was on its way for 2019.
He pitched about half a season that year, but was excellent across 16 starts. Montas managed a career-best 2.63 ERA while striking out more than a batter per inning for the A’s. Although he struggled in the shortened 2020 season, ‘21 was his best year to date, and the one that likely solidified the Yankees’ interest. It was the first year of his career with a full starter’s workload, as he started 32 games, and for the most part, Montas was terrific. He topped 200 strikeouts, and had a matching ERA and FIP of 3.37, doing so in a career-high 187 innings of work. It was an All-Star level season, and one that earned him some down-ballot Cy Young love and a sixth-place finish for the award.
Montas began the 2022 season with Oakland right where he left off, as he made 19 starts at basically the exact same level he had pitched at in the season prior. And, with the Yankees in need of some help in the rotation, they sent a crop of interesting minor league pitchers to Oakland in return for Montas’ services (as well as reliever Lou Trivino).
Despite the excellent nearly 300-inning run Montas was coming off of, his time in New York was difficult from the very beginning. The righty gave up six runs across just three innings in his first Yankee start, and gave up six more two starts later. Across his first five starts in pinstripes, Montas held a bloated 7.01 ERA. After that rough stretch, the then 29-year-old made what was probably his best start for New York, when he allowed just one hit and struck out seven against the Rays in five scoreless innings. His season ended with a not-so-great relief appearance in the ALCS that season against the loathsome Astros.
His numbers with the Yankees were rough following the trade, but there was still hope that he could be a solid rotation regular for the 2023 season. That was until a shoulder injury had him getting surgery in February of that year, which would hold him out for almost the entire season.
Perhaps the Yankees should have been more cognizant about these risks in getting into the Frankie Montas business, as injuries were nothing new for him and his shoulder had, in fact, been bugging him. He’d suffered shoulder inflammation earlier in 2022 and the following spring, he admitted that he was pitching through the pain when the Yankees acquired him:
“I was trying to push through … I got traded to a new team and wanted to show what I could do. Things didn’t go the way I was expecting.”
What was once a promising trade turned into just a single relief appearance in the 2023 season. With that, Frankie Montas’ tenure with the Yankees was over, as he was never able to hit his stride before injuries effectively ended the former Athletic’s time in the Bronx.
Following his stint with the Yankees, he signed with the Cincinnati Reds in free agency, and was eventually shipped to Milwaukee in another trade mid-year. Montas was actually able to make 30 starts in 2024, though the performance was still largely forgettable, as he sported a FIP creeping towards five. Either way, seeing him toss 150 innings for just the second time in his career was promising in its own right.
Montas then signed with the Mets, and as fate would have it, 2025 would be yet another season cut short. After nine games (seven starts), Montas went down once again, eventually leading to Tommy John surgery at the end of the season, which will have him missing all of 2026 as well. Despite the additional tough blow, Montas was at least able to exercise a player option on his deal with the Mets for this season. Surely, both he and the Mets likely wish the deal had gone down differently.
Montas’ career, despite the solid peaks, has been marked largely by disappointment and time spent off the field. He has shown talent, but minimal ability to stay on the mound for extended periods. Unfortunately for them, the Yankees likely saw some of the worst of Montas, as their trade for him during the 2022 season gave them minimal innings—and even fewer quality ones—rather than the potential top-line starter he looked the part of at times. The best that can be said is that none of the prospects they traded for him ended up biting them that much; lefty J.P. Sears is the winner in the clubhouse there and he’s only mustered 2.4 career fWAR since leaving the Yankees.
Regardless of how his time with the Yankees worked out, hopefully Montas will bounce back from Tommy John and return to the majors in 2027, though it has always been an uphill battle for the righty.
See more of the “Yankees Birthday of the Day” series here.
