The New York Yankees outrighted right-hander Alexander Cornielle off the major league roster and onto the roster of the Florida Complex League Yankees on Thursday, closing a brief big-league stay that began and ended in the final week of the regular season, via the MiLB transaction log.
It is an outright assignment, not an option: Cornielle was removed from the 40-man roster after clearing waivers and assigned to the complex-league affiliate in Tampa.
With the minor league season already over, the FCL placement is a bookkeeping destination rather than an active assignment. He is expected to become a minor league free agent.
Cornielle, 25, was born August 22, 2001, in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.
The Brewers signed him as an international free agent in 2019, and he spent his entire professional career in that organization before reaching minor league free agency.
The Yankees signed him to a minor league contract on December 17, 2025, and assigned him to Triple-A Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
He made the majors for the first time on September 25, when New York selected his contract before the second game of a doubleheader against the Orioles. Fernando Cruz was transferred to the 60-day injured list to open a 40-man spot. Cornielle worked the ninth inning of a 6-3 win, his only big-league appearance.
He allowed two earned runs on three hits and a walk in one inning, including a solo home run and an RBI double, then struck out Rece Hinds and Christian Franklin to finish the game. He left with an 18.00 ERA and a 4.00 WHIP.
Four days later, the Yankees designated him for assignment to reinstate Giancarlo Stanton from the 60-day injured list ahead of the American League Wild Card Series. Thursday’s outright completed that process.
The cup of coffee followed a useful year in the minors. Cornielle made 21 appearances, 20 of them starts, across Single-A, Double-A, and Triple-A, posting a 3.39 ERA and a 1.42 WHIP over 85 innings with 89 strikeouts.
The swing-and-miss was real — a strikeout rate around 24 percent and a swinging-strike rate of 12.1 percent — but so were the walks, at roughly 13 percent.
Evaluators have noted a four-pitch mix that could interest another club, though the most likely path is another minor league deal, in New York or elsewhere.
For the Yankees, the transaction is routine roster cleanup as the postseason begins.
For Cornielle, it ends a debut that lasted one inning and produced the last out of a win, and returns him to the open market he left last winter.
