HOUSTON — Another Yankee is injured, though Chase Hampton’s absence won’t directly hurt the big league club.
The organization’s top pitching prospect is recovering from an ulnar collateral ligament sprain, a team spokesperson told the Daily News on Thursday. As a result, the right-hander will start the minor league season on the injured list.
Hampton received a PRP injection a little more than two weeks ago. At the time, he was shut down from throwing for four to six weeks.
“There’s gonna be some downtime,” Yankees pitching coach Matt Blake told The News, though he didn’t have all the details on Hampton’s injury as his team prepared for Opening Day. “I don’t know what the level of concern is for him coming back in a couple of weeks or if it’s longer than that.”
The 22-year-old Hampton, invited to big league camp for the first time this spring, only pitched in one exhibition game. He struck out two and walked one over one scoreless inning against the Rays on Feb 27.
The Yankees reassigned Hampton to minor league camp on March 3.
“It sounded like he was having a hard time when he went down to the minor league side,” Blake said, “but I haven’t really followed up on it just because we’ve been running around in circles.”
A sixth-round pick out of Texas Tech in 2022, Hampton made his professional debut in 2023. He recorded a 2.68 ERA over nine starts at High-A Hudson Valley before posting a 4.37 mark over 11 starts for Double-A Somerset. All in all, Hampton finished the season with a 3.63 ERA.
Despite Hampton’s limited experience, various members of the Yankees organization mentioned him when discussing the team’s 2024 starting depth this spring.
“I don’t know if it will be this year,” Blake said over the offseason, “but he’s obviously on the radar.”
