Davies finds relief in return to Stadium mound

THE FIRST time Kyle Davies walked into Yankee Stadium, he didn’t realize the deck was already sort of stacked against him.

It was Aug. 4, 2007 and the 23-year-old had just been traded from the Braves to the Royals in the middle of his third big-league season. What he got in New York was a playoff atmosphere. The old Stadium was packed and electric in anticipation of Alex Rodriguez hitting his 500th home run.

Sure enough, Davies gave it up in the first inning, a threerun shot.

Davies was back at the Stadium on Sunday after the Yankees called him up from TripleA Scranton/Wilkes Barre. He recorded the last seven outs of the Bombers’ 14-4 victory over the Red Sox. When he came in to face David Ortiz, Davies was throwing his first big-league pitches since July 25, 2011. He had rotator cuff surgery, missed all of 2012 rehabbing from it and spent the last two seasons pitching in the minors for the Twins and Indians.

“I wasn’t nervous. I was more going to try to take it in as I ran in from the bullpen and really enjoy it,” he said.

Asked about the intensity of returning after all that time to face Boston’s most feared slugger, Davies said, “It was déjà vu because that was the last batter I faced, too.” He got a right-side groundout that time too.

Davies was signed by the Yankees a week before spring training opened and one of the first things he did when he arrived at camp was thank Rodriguez for Aug. 4, 2007.

“I told him, ‘Thank you for signing a bat for me,’” Davies said. “I sent a ball over and asked if he could write something and sign it. He sent me a bat. So I thanked him when I saw him. It wasn’t something he had to do.”

Mostly, Davies remembered the newness of all that happened that night in the wake of the trade.

“I remember looking around the park and thinking it was a cool atmosphere. I probably didn’t take it in as best as I could at the time, but looking back it’s a good thing to be a part of,” he said. “As a pitcher, you never want to give up homers, but looking back on it, it was an interesting experience.”

Davies was 27 and in his seventh season when he suffered the shoulder injury. He couldn’t pick up a ball for six months and spent the rest of that year doing rehab. In 2013 and 2014 he pitched in 38 minor-league games in the Twins and Indians organizations, ranging from Class A to Triple-A.

“I don’t know if I ever doubted I’d get back to the big leagues. I always thought I’d be able to do it. It takes a lot of things falling correctly to get back and you have to pitch well,” he said. “I always believed I could do it. I just didn’t know it would happen.

“Pitching in the minors is not where anyone wants to be. But it’s pitching. I took a whole year off in 2012 to rehab the shoulder, so playing anywhere was better than staying at home and not having a team.”

Pitching relief is new for Davies, so he wasn’t guessing when he would next get in a game. Instead, he was just enjoying the end of what he called “a long road back.”