HOUSTON — Marcus Stroman admittedly did not sleep much, or eat much, ahead of making his Yankees debut on Saturday night.
“Very excited,” Stroman said. “A bunch of anxiety.”
But it did little to throw the right-hander off his game.
Stroman tossed six strong innings in which he gave up only three unearned runs as the Yankees beat the Astros 5-3 at Minute Maid Park.
He gave the Yankees exactly what they needed on a night when they were short in the bullpen.
“Felt good to get out there and get a win and get the job done,” Stroman said. “It was definitely a lot that went into it, a lot of excitement, so get it past me now and get into my routine and get on a roll here.”
The Astros’ three runs off Stroman were all due in part to errors, including a play in the fifth inning on which Anthony Volpe and Stroman each committed throwing errors to allow a run to score.
But Stroman didn’t let the fielding snafu turn into a bigger mess.
“I thought he was so sharp,” manager Aaron Boone said. “We’re probably a couple plays made from him throwing six shutout and then maybe he goes deeper in the game even. I thought he was pinpoint.”
A day after getting drilled on the right thumb by a 93 mph fastball, Gleyber Torres was back in the lineup Saturday, going 1-for-4 with a walk. Torres came out to the field early on Saturday afternoon to play catch, as a concern over his ability to throw prompted him to pull himself out of Friday’s game in the seventh inning.
Clayton Beeter’s MLB debut lasted three pitches Friday night — and he got three outs — but then on Saturday, it was back to Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
The Yankees optioned Beeter to Triple-A before Saturday’s game and called up left-hander Tanner Tully to provide them more length in the bullpen. Despite Beeter, who is normally a starter, only throwing three pitches to close out Friday’s win, the Yankees did not want to take any chances with throwing the 25-year-old on back-to-back days this early.
“Really just being thin down there [in the bullpen] and him being a starting pitcher, some of his [injury] history, just not wanting to put him in a bad situation if something happened where we had to do something early and we’re really thin and don’t have real length,” Boone said. “The reality is — and he felt good today — we could probably throw him out there. But when you’re not built for that, it concerns me.”
Beeter will stay built up at Triple-A “and hopefully be back here shorter rather than later,” Boone said.
“We’re really excited about him,” Boone said. “I know he’s going to help us a lot this year.”
Beeter, a Fort Worth, Texas native, had a large group of family and friends in attendance Friday night to see his debut, however brief it was.
To make room for Tully on the 40-man roster, the Yankees designated reliever Nick Ramirez for assignment.
Giancarlo Stanton was out of the lineup Saturday but was fine physically, Boone said. Aaron Judge slotted in at DH and Trent Grisham got his first start of the year in center field.