With James Paxton sidelined until May at the earliest to begin the regular season, the Yankees need additional pitchers to back up J.A. Happ and Jordan Montgomery at the back end of the rotation. Bettis has been a starter for most of his major-league career. He posted a career-high 32 starts with Colorado in 2016, earning 14 wins and pitching to a 4.79 ERA.
Bettis has dealt with a lot of adversity in recent year as he was limited to just nine starts in 2017 because of testicular cancer. He returned to the Rockies in August of that season and threw seven shutout innings in his 2017 debut.