Hess shows power but keeps running hot-and-cold as Yankees top prospects sort through July 4 at Somerset

The Yankees’ pipeline stayed active on July 4, with one major pause in the Triple-A picture and another day of mixed indicates at Double-A. In Scranton/Wilkes-Barre’s Triple-A matchup against the Norfolk Tides, the game was postponed, leaving at least one affiliate outcome from the holiday slate unresolved. Meanwhile, at Double-A Somerset, top prospect Ben Hess continued to land somewhere between breakthrough and adjustment, producing a stat line that included both damage and command issues during his appearance.

Hess, a first-round pitching prospect, worked four innings and allowed five hits and three runs while issuing three walks and recording two strikeouts. The part of the line that stood out most was the power showing up against him, with two home runs allowed. Those numbers do not erase the prospect’s overall upside, but they do reinforce what the organization has been trying to refine: turning raw stuff and competitiveness into repeatable run-prevention each time he takes the ball.

Somerset’s overall day also reflected the developmental grind. The team recorded multiple multi-hit efforts in the lineup, including Connor McGinnis going 3-for-3, Core Jackson reaching base and driving in runs, and an extended offensive output from David McCann, who went 3-for-4 with two home runs and seven RBI. Even in games where pitching is the primary focus, position-player production often matters because it changes how pitchers can regroup from one inning to the next and how quickly a starter’s margin gets tested.

The rest of the pitching staff offered a different kind of contrast. While Hess had the most extended work for Somerset, other arms contributed relief innings, including Hayden Merda, who logged 2.1 scoreless innings with five strikeouts, and Wilmy Sanchez, who threw 1.2 innings without allowing a hit while striking out four. Somerset also received a save from Tanner Bauman, who closed the door after a brief late appearance. Taken together, it points to a bullpen that can absorb a shaky start while still leaving the Yankees with a clear target for improvement in the starter’s consistency.

This pattern has been part of the broader conversation surrounding Somerset as a proving ground. In a prior discussion with the Trentonian, Somerset pitching coach Demetre Kokoris emphasized process and efficiency as the standard, saying the goal is to stay within the moment, throw strikes, and let competitiveness translate into outcomes. That matters for Hess specifically because an outing can look like a high-upside start early, then shift when a mistake location stays in the danger zone long enough to become damage.

For Yankees fans, the July 4 results are a reminder that prospect development does not move in a straight line. Hess’s outing included both the kind of bullpen-management demands that push teams to the limit and the kind of leverage moments that can accelerate growth if he responds well in the next turn. The postponement in Triple-A adds another layer to the organization’s immediate evaluation, since it can delay the kind of cross-affiliate comparisons that typically accompany holiday slates.

Next to watch is how Hess responds after a line like this, particularly whether the walks and the two-homer damage show up again or tighten quickly. On the position-player side, Somerset’s offense provides a stable baseline for pitchers to improve against, but the Yankees’ long-term priority remains the same: controlling the strike zone and turning that control into fewer innings where the opposition gets full swings. With the player development season moving deeper into summer, those small adjustments tend to determine whether a prospect’s “up and down” stretch becomes a sustained trend.

For organizational context, MLB’s Yankees minor league prospects page continues to track the club’s top talent as they progress through the system. That tracking is especially relevant for a prospect like Hess, whose role in the rotation picture will increasingly depend on whether performances look less like isolated peaks and more like repeatable stability.