BOSTON — Perhaps the most immediate consequence of losing J.A. Happ to hand, foot and mouth disease is that instead of turning to the veteran lefty — whom the Yankees acquired last week for situations just like Saturday’s game against the Red Sox at Fenway Park — they will instead go with Chance Adams in his MLB debut.
Adams, who turns 24 in a week, was once one of the Yankees’ prized prospects, but he’s been slow to regain his velocity after offseason surgery to remove bone spurs from his right elbow, and his promotion from Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre is more a move of desperation than a reward for performance.
“Obviously, we’re a little depleted here of late with some of the moves we had to make,” Aaron Boone said before the Yankees faced the Red Sox on Friday after being thumped Thursday. “[Adams] is scheduled to go [Saturday] coming off a really strong start. We hope he can give us a quality outing and give us a chance.”
It wasn’t the highest of recommendations from the Yankees manager, but it was an honest assessment.
The Yankees hope Adams’ recent improvement on the mound is a sign he’s back to where he was last season, when he was ranked by MLB.com as the organization’s second-best prospect, behind only Gleyber Torres.
That’s when he had 21 starts with SWB and went 11-5 with a 2.89 ERA and a 1.08 WHIP with the RailRiders. In 21 starts with SWB this year, Adams is 3-5 with a 4.50 ERA and a 1.32 WHIP in 98 innings.
But in his last outing, Adams gave up just two hits and an unearned run in 7 ¹/₃ innings against Rochester. He walked four in one of his best performances of the season.
“His stuff has built up over the past few months, especially that last time out,’’ pitching coach Larry Rothschild said. “He’s close to where he was before the surgery. I don’t know if he’s all the way there, but he’s approaching it.”
Lefty Justus Sheffield, who has pitched to a 1.27 ERA in his past six starts with SWB, pitched Thursday and wasn’t an option.
“They’ll call me up when they feel my time is ready,’’ Adams told The Post over the weekend. “Whether it’s here [with the Yankees] or wherever, I mean, I’m sure I’ll get my shot.”
Now that it’s coming, Adams won’t just be facing one of the top offenses in the majors, he’ll also be on the mound in hostile territory in a tough park to pitch in.
“Whenever you get an opportunity, you’ve got to take advantage of it,’’ Rothschild said. “It could happen at any time. It just happens to be here against this team. He’s pitched for a while, and he’s in a good place, I hope.”
The Yankees have done well with several other minor leaguers who have been thrust into important spots this year, with Domingo German and Jonathan Loaisiga showing they were up to the task — if only for brief periods of time.
“Hopefully, [Adams], as we’ve seen with a lot of our guys, they’ve been able to come up and handle these situations,” Boone said. “It’s a tribute to our player development for preparing these guys for what it is to come up and pitch in the fire. He’s coming here to a big-time environment, and hopefully we’ve prepared him for all the outside stuff and not just between the lines.’’
Bobby Mitchell, Adams’ manager at Triple-A, told reporters, including the Times Tribune, that Adams “has it in him, definitely.”
“As focused as he is on the mound and [if] he goes out there with confidence,” Mitchell said. “He can pitch anywhere, really, if he has his confidence going and he’s throwing strikes.”
So will this challenge be a good thing for Adams?
“Ask me after the game,’’ Rothschild said.