Rain pushes Yankees-Tigers doubleheader back to June 4

Both games of Sunday’s doubleheader between the New York Yankees and Detroit Tigers were postponed because of rain. The games will be made up in a split doubleheader on June 4. The Tigers were scheduled to be off, while the Yankees would have been travelling between games in Baltimore and Toronto. Game 1 was scratched about three hours before the scheduled first pitch, with Game 2 called in the early afternoon. Rain was forecast to continue until Monday morning. The Yankees and Tigers were rained out Saturday in what had been New York’s only scheduled visit to Detroit this year. The Yankees won 8-6 behind two Aaron Hicks homers in Friday’s game. Yankees pitcher Luis Severino (21, 3.50) will now start on Monday at home against the Miami Marlins, while Detroit’s Francisco Liriano (1-1, 2.13) will pitch Tuesday against Baltimore. Meanwhile, the Cleveland Indians and Toronto Blue Jays will try again in a couple of weeks. The teams will play a traditional doubleheader starting at 1:10 p.m. on May 3 at Progressive Field after their series finale was postponed by rain Sunday. The game was called about four hours before the scheduled 1:10 p.m. first pitch. Saturday ’s game also was rained out. Toronto broke the Indians’ fivegame winning streak with an 8-4 victory Friday night.

Both teams should have a better chance of getting on the field in their next series. The Indians open a two-game series in San Juan, Puerto Rico, against the Minnesota Twins on Tuesday night. The Blue Jays start a three-game series against Kansas City at Rogers Centre on Monday night.

Corey Kluber (1-1) will pitch the first game against the Twins. The reigning AL Cy Young winner struck out 13 and allowed two hits in eight innings for his first win of the season against Detroit on April 9. Jaime Garcia (1-0) had been scheduled to start Sunday for Toronto, which has won seven of 10. The Blue Jays are playing without third baseman Josh Donaldson, who was placed on the 10-day disabled list Friday with a sore right shoulder. The 2015 AL MVP is batting .239 with three homers and nine RBIs in 12 games. Donaldson is in Florida working on a throwing program; it’s unclear how long he’ll be out.

Left fielder Teoscar Hernandez, called up from Triple-A Buffalo to replace Donaldson, drove in the winning run with an RBI double in the seventh inning off relief ace Andrew Miller on Friday. Right fielder Randal Grichuk, acquired from St. Louis in January, has struggled through the first two weeks, batting .071 amid a 1-for16 slump.