WATCH: Yankees' Cortes Messes with Hitter in Hilarious Fashion
New York Yankees pitcher Nestor Cortes is one of the most creative pitchers in Major League Baseball. He's able to be deceptive and mess with timing by varying his looks and delivery.
And that was on full display on Tuesday during his spring training start against the Nationals.
That's some high-level entertainment value, especially for the final day of spring training. But it also brings up some interesting points.
1) Umpires will be on the lookout for the quick pitch in 2023. Cortes, Johnny Cueto, Marcus Stroman and others who like to mess with hitters timing could potentially be at risk of not being able to deploy tactics they've used in the past.
2) The broadcaster brings up a good question before he's cut off.... if Luis Garcia of the Astros can't use his delivery from a season ago, is there any issue with what Cortes just did? Garcia had to ditch his because of a crackdown on balks, so we'll see if any umpire gives Cortes any grief for this in 2023.
No matter what, this was a fun moment at the end of a long spring training. Cortes, in addition to being fun to watch, is easy to root for. He languished for three teams in three years (2018-2020) before latching on with the Yankees (again) in 2021. He made the All-Star Game in 2022 after going 12-4 with a 2.44 ERA in 158.1 innings.
He'll be another huge part of the Yankees rotation in 2023, especially as the team deals with injuries at the outset of the season to Luis Severino, Frankie Montas and Carlos Rodon.
Cortes tossed four innings of one-run ball against the Nationals. His first regular season start is scheduled for Monday, April 3rd against the Phillies.
The Yankees open up the season on Thursday against the Giants at 1:05.
