YANKS BLAST JAYS
Brett Gardner has two homers and a double as Yankees rout Toronto.
YANKEES 13, BLUE JAYS 3
TORONTO — A player who started the season very much an afterthought ranks high on the list of players the Yankees can least afford to lose down the stretch.
He’s 36, but with the continued attrition that injuries have taken on the outfielders, Brett Gardner’s value has never been higher.
Fortunately for the Yankees, he has been equal to the task.
Gardner did it again Saturday, contributing two home runs and a double, driving in five runs and making a Gold Glove-caliber catch to steal an extra-base hit as the Yankees beat the Blue Jays, 13-3, in front of 26,308 at Rogers Centre.
“He just continues to play on both sides of the ball so well,” Aaron Boone said. “He hasn’t stopped being a good player. We wouldn’t be this well off without him, that’s for sure.”
James Paxton, making a strong push to be the Yankees’ Game 1 starter in the ALDS, won for the ninth straight start. He wasn’t as good as in many of those outings but grinded through, allowing one run, five hits and two walks in five innings. Paxton (14-6, 3.88) has a 2.50 ERA and 0.96 WHIP during that stretch.
“Higgy did a great job behind the plate mixing up pitches,” Paxton said of catcher Kyle Higashioka. “Didn’t have a lot in the tank today. Didn’t have the sharpest stuff but was able to make pitches when we needed to to get out of innings.”
Paxton, in his first season as a Yankee, shook his head over Gardner’s performance.
“He is killing it,” Paxton said. “He’s been great for us all year long, in the outfield and at the plate. Really doing it all, and that’s not even talking about his leadership skills and how great
he is in this clubhouse.”
When the Yankees signed Gardner to a oneyear, $7.5 million free agent deal in the offseason, they intended to use him as a reserve outfielder. Instead, injuries forced him into everyday duties and he has had a career season.
His two homers Saturday gave him 25, four more than his previous high. He also robbed Danny Jansen of an extra-base hit with a leaping catch as he banged into the wall in left-center for the first out of the fifth.
So, what did he enjoy more, the two-homer day or the acrobatic catch?
“That’s a tough question,” he said with a slight grin. “If you said one homer and a catch, I’d probably go with the catch. But I’ll take the two homers I guess.”
Of the power surge at 36, Gardner said he’s made “a little change in the approach and the way I prepare.”
“I take my ‘A’ swing more often,” he said. “(Don’t) worry about, especially early in the count, just putting the ball in play (like I did) for the first eight or ten years of my career, but really focus on driving the baseball. Some days are better than others.”
Thanks to Gardner’s five RBIs, the Yankees (98-52) already were ahead 6-0 when the Blue Jays scored their only run off Paxton. Gleyber Torres (No. 37) and Luke Voit (No. 21) hit backto-back homers in the sixth and Mike Ford (No. 11) gave the Yankees their fifth home run of the day in the ninth.
The Yankees have an MLB-high 285 homers in 150 games, 18 more than the major-league record of 267 they set last year. The Twins, who broke that record earlier this season before the Yankees passed them, had 280 in 147 games entering the second game of their doubleheader against the Indians.
The Yankees had 19 hits, four by DJ LeMahieu, who also was robbed of a hit in his first at-bat.
It was an overall impressive game after the disappointing, sloppy loss in 12 innings the night before.
“I feel like they’ve done that all year,” Boone said. “When we’ve hit a bump in the road or had a bad game, they’re really good at turning the page. They did again (today).”