NEW YORK – Beyond the obvious potential impact on the standings, Saturday’s doubleheader against the Toronto Blue Jays gave New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi other reasons for pause.
"The use of your bullpen, and physically how long it is to have guys on their feet," he said Saturday. "Start to factor in that you may get some rain delays in some of the games – it’s a long day, and you worry not only about today, but you worry about the effects that it has on your guys in the upcoming days."
There was lots of rain in the forecast for late Saturday afternoon, into the evening.
The Blue Jays took a 2.5 game lead over the Yankees into the twin-bill, giving them a chance to take a commanding lead.
"If you get swept, I think that it becomes harder to win your division, but that does not mean it’s impossible," said Girardi. "In a sense there’s still a lot that can happen in the 21 games after today. There’s a ton that can happen. You can’t get too high or too low, depending on what happens. You have to stay even keel and go out and continue to play good baseball."
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LOUP RETURNS: Aaron Loup pitched his first complete inning for the Blue Jays since Aug. 12 in closing out Friday’s 11-5 win over the Yankees, striking out two batters in a clean frame.
It’s the fourth outing for the left-hander since rejoining the team as a September call-up, getting only five batters in the previous three outings. On Friday, he popped up Rob Refsnyder, before striking out Jacoby Ellsbury and Brett Gardner.
"That was good," said Loup. "Big for me, I needed it, a nice clean inning, pretty simple, I got to go in there, throw some sliders, work on some stuff, and it went well."
Loup changed his slider early in the season, trying to get it tighter, but feels that caused a change in arm slot that flattened out his fastball. He worked on that during his time at triple-A Buffalo, and if he can regain his past form, he could give the Blue Jays an option as a second lefty.
"Everything is back to where it needs to be," he said. "Back to the old slider, the bigger slider, and for whatever reason it’s got my hand position right, my arm slot right and I got the life back on my fastball, and the slider has been good the past few outings."
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PLUSHED OUT: First it was scooters that David Price hooked up some of his Toronto Blue Jays teammates with. Now the ace left-hander has provided everyone with plush blue bathrobes, with a team logo on the front and nameplate along with jersey number on the back.
Hugh Hefner would be envious.
"It serves as a towel to put on when you get out of the shower or the hot tub," Price said of the robes, which arrived Friday. "I had some towel shorts from Johnny Damon in 2010 and those were really cool. So they’re just really cool to have."
