Phil Hughes

Phil Hughes was supposed to be the next great homegrown Yankees ace, and for one stretch in the summer of 2010, he actually looked like it. The New York Yankees took him 23rd overall in the 2004 draft, watched him rocket up the prospect rankings, and handed him a rotation spot before he'd finished growing into his 6'5" frame. He won a ring in 2009, made an All-Star team in 2010, and left town in 2013 with a lot of "what could've been" still attached to his name. That's not a tragedy. That's just what happens to a lot of hyped young arms in the Bronx.

The Prospect

Hughes signed out of Foothill High School in Santa Ana, California, and moved fast. By 2006 he was No. 39 on Baseball America's Top 100. By 2007, he was No. 4 -- one of the best pitching prospects in the entire sport, full stop. (Some in the organization started calling him "Phil Franchise." That's a lot to live up to before you've thrown a single big-league pitch.)

He debuted on April 26, 2007, against Toronto -- a rough outing, 4.1 innings, 4 earned runs, took the loss. Five days later came the start everyone still talks about. Facing Texas on May 1, Hughes carried a no-hitter into the seventh inning -- 6.1 hitless innings against a big-league lineup, in his second career start -- before he pulled his hamstring throwing a pitch to Mark Teixeira. He left the game. The bullpen gave up a hit minutes later. Hughes still got the win, but he also got three months on the disabled list. (I still think about that one. Kid's got a no-hitter going in start number two, and his own leg takes it away from him.)

The Big Three

That September, Hughes returned alongside Joba Chamberlain and Ian Kennedy -- three homegrown first-round arms, all up in the same year, all supposed to be the answer after years of the Yankees buying rotation help on the open market. The press dubbed them the "Big Three." Chamberlain was the electric one, sitting mid-to-upper 90s as Rivera's setup man. Hughes came back and went 5-3 with a 4.46 ERA in 72.2 innings. It felt like the start of something.

Then 2008 happened. A rib injury wrecked Hughes's spring, he made just 8 starts, and finished 0-4 with a 6.62 ERA. Kennedy got shipped to the minors after an 8.17 ERA. The "Big Three" hype cooled fast. (Prospect rankings are a hell of a drug.)

The Setup Man Who Won a Ring

Here's the part people forget: Hughes's best pitching in 2009 didn't come as a starter. The Yankees moved him to the bullpen and made him the primary eighth-inning man in front of Mo, and he was outstanding -- 8-3, a 3.03 ERA, 96 strikeouts in 86 innings, even picked up 3 saves filling in when needed. That's a phenomenal season out of the pen for a guy who'd been groomed as a starter his whole life.

The 2009 World Series run wasn't Hughes's finest month -- he struggled in October (an 8.53 ERA across 9 appearances) while David Robertson, Chamberlain, and Damaso Marte handled the bridge to Rivera. But he was on that roster, he pitched in that postseason, and when the Yankees beat the Phillies in six games to win it all, Hughes got a ring for it. First one of his career. Not every ring comes with a Cy Young-caliber October, and that's fine.

2010: The Year It Clicked

Hughes finally got his shot as a full-time starter in 2010, and he ran with it. He opened 6-1 with a 2.70 ERA through May and kept it rolling all first half, earning his first and only All-Star selection -- he got the call at Angel Stadium that July, pitched a little, and went back to work. He finished the year 18-8 with a 4.19 ERA across 176.1 innings, a career year by any measure. In that 2010 ALDS, he threw seven scoreless innings to clinch the Yankees' sweep over Minnesota in Game 3 -- the kind of start that makes you think the ace projection was right all along.

(It wasn't the last great start of his career. It just felt that way in the moment.)

The Decline

2011 brought a scary, vague injury -- Hughes went on the DL in April with what the team called a "dead arm." Doctors tested him for thoracic outlet syndrome. The tests came back negative, which was good news, but he never looked like himself that season -- 5-5, 5.79 ERA, his stuff clearly diminished.

He bounced back some in workload in 2012 -- 16-13, 191.1 innings -- but ran into a genuinely strange problem: he couldn't stop giving up home runs. Hughes allowed 35 homers that year, second-most in all of baseball, and 22 of them came at Yankee Stadium -- the most home runs surrendered at home by any pitcher in the majors that season, and a single-season franchise record. (Try posting a winning record while doing that. It's not easy. He basically did it anyway.)

2013 was rougher still -- 4-14, 5.19 ERA, and by the end of it, everyone could see the Yankees weren't going to bring him back.

Where He Went

Hughes became a free agent after the 2013 season and signed with the Minnesota Twins that December -- three years, $24 million. He wasn't traded. His run in New York simply ended, and he moved on. (People mix this up constantly. He walked, he didn't get shipped out.) He'd go on to have a genuinely good bounce-back year in Minnesota before arm trouble caught up with him again a few years later, but that's a Twins story, not a Yankees one.

Seven seasons, 56 wins, one championship ring, one All-Star game, and a lot of moments where the talent was undeniable even when the results weren't. That's Phil Hughes in pinstripes.