Sevy safe from COVID-19, will pitch tomorrow
TORONTO — Luis Severino is ready to pitch again. After being scratched from Thursday’s start with a fever and chills, Severino was cleared from the COVID injured list in time to make the flight here and will pitch on Sunday.
“So we’ll pitch him Sunday. Gerrit (Cole) will bump to Monday in Tampa,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said before Friday’s series opener against the Blue Jays at the Rogers Centre. “So yeah glad yesterday was a good day for him feeling better and obviously able to travel with us so he gets some throwing in today and be ready to roll Sunday.”
Severino felt sick Wednesday night. He tested negative for COVID in multiple tests, allowing him to fly on the charter with the team to Toronto Thursday night.
The rearranging may end up helping the Yankees in the long run.
Severino has matched up better against this dangerous lineup than Cole has this year. The Blue Jays got three earned runs in 5.2 innings off Cole last time he saw them. Severino has faced them three times already and they have scored three earned runs in 9.2 innings pitched. Severino had a harder time with the Rays, allowing four earned runs in one start (6.1 innings pitched.)
More importantly, they have to manage Severino’s workload this season anyway. The 28-yearold has pitched a total of 27.2 big league innings over the previous three seasons because of injuries. He will head into Sunday’s start with 61 innings pitched just over a third of the way through the season. Pushing him back after an excellent spot start by Clarke Schmidt is one way to limit his work. It’s something they have also done purposefully with Nestor Cortes.
“You got to pay attention to it. So, again, we’ll make evaluations with our eyes and how they’re doing, but also how we can measure physically and see how they’re doing according to their baseline. That’ll be something that we pay attention to,”
Boone said. “So whether we have a big lead (in the division standings) or not, that’s going to factor into how we have to maneuver.
“In the case of Nestor and Sevy, right now I feel like they’re both doing really well, they’re ina good spot,” Boone continued. “We’ve been fortunate that we have been able to, especially a few times with Sevy, push him back to a seventh or an eighth day. The illness the other day is going to pitch him now in the eighth or ninth day, which hopefully it’s something that a tough situation turned into something that hopefully benefits him a little bit. We’ve done it a couple of times on Nestor. So be mindful of that stuff as we go through.”
BUSINESS OF BASEBALL
Ryan Weber’s been around long enough to know what would happen Thursday night. The reliever came up huge for the Yankees with 3.2 innings on a night that their starter was scratched and in a stretch of 20 straight games they couldn’t burn through their bullpen.
In other words, he saved their bacon. And he was basically rewarded with a pink slip, being designated for assignment after the game.
That’s just how it goes for a journeyman pitcher in baseball these days.
So Weber made it easy on Boone.
“Obviously he gets in and does what he did, he came in after the game kind of knowing what he was coming in for and had a smile on his face and was just appreciative of being up there,” Boone said. “In that kind of situation, where you get designated if there’s something out there for you, I hope it works out. If not we love having you, hope to have you and if he does go through (waivers without being claimed by another team) he can go down to Scranton and continue what’s been a strong season for him down there and obviously making himself more and more of a candidate (to come back up).”