Price on paternity leave, status up in air
NEW YORK — The best excuse possible to leave a baseball team — the birth of a baby — has lent some uncertainty to the pitching plans for both the Red Sox and the Yankees.
David Price and the Yankees’ J.A. Happ went on paternity leave yesterday. Both are scheduled to start tomorrow night.
Assuming all goes smoothly, both fathers still are hopeful to be able to be back to work.
“Hopefully,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said about Price returning. “He can be on the list for a maximum of three days so hopefully he can be here with us.”
Yankees manager Aaron Boone said the plan currently is for Happ to be on the mound Sunday.
Cora took three days’ paternity leave when he was bench coach in Houston in 2017.
“I was telling somebody earlier today it puts everything in perspective,” Cora said. “These guys are athletes and everybody expects them to perform on a nightly basis. I know they make a lot of money, but at the end they’re human beings and they’ve got their families. Hopefully for both families — happy for both of them. If they can compete on Sunday it’ll be great.
“Probably the first (time), huh, that something like that happened? But it puts everything in perspective.”
Hembree to IL
Heath Hembree, one of the most effective Red Sox relievers the first half of the season (11.2 strikeouts per nine innings, 2.64 ERA) is back on the IL after an elbow injury that never fully healed flared up again.
The right-hander expressed optimism he would be able to return this season, although he could not offer a timetable for his return, only that when he returned he truly would be good to pitch.
“This time I want to make sure it’s completely gone, I want to make sure it has no symptoms of what I had previously, this time I want to try and do it the right way,” Hembree said.
He admitted the elbow was not 100 percent when he did return, but he figured, wrongly, it would feel better.
“I can’t say it was ever completely gone. It was there but I felt like I was good enough to pitch. I would throw one game and the next morning it was a little crankier than the day before, just something I was trying to grind through and it just came to a point where it just really wasn’t worth it anymore.”
Hembree did not look good in his inning of work Thursday night against the Rays, allowing a homer, another hit, a walk and a strikeout to the six batters he faced.
“It’s something that is very concerning,” Cora said. “This is a guy that is a big part of what we do in the bullpen and it’s hard for him, obviously, and not having him now, somebody else has to step up.”
Hembree said an MRI revealed nothing alarming. For now, he will wait for inflammation and discomfort to subside before resuming baseball activities.
“I’m definitely expecting to be back this season but we don’t know if it’s going to be one week, two weeks, three weeks, just not sure,” Hembree said.
Sale starts it
Chris Sale will start the first game of today’s doubleheader, with Brian Johnson the starter for Game 2. The Yankees will throw Domingo German in the first game and use an opener in the second game.
In each of the last five Red Sox-Yankees doubleheaders, the Yankees won Game 1 with the Red Sox taking Game 2. …
The five-game losing streak is the longest for the Red Sox since losing eight in a row in July 2015. … The Sox have homered in eight straight games.
J.D. Martinez hit his 24th home run, his fourth in his last seven games. He has six home runs in 12 games against the Yankees this season . ...
The Red Sox are the middle of a stretch in which they are playing 17 games in 16 days, and 34 games over 34 days. Following that, they will play just 13 games in 19 days from mid-August to Sept. 2.