A little advice goes a long, long way for Higgy
Kyle Higashioka had started to lose time to Jose Trevino in their platoon because of his offense. It has not affected their close working relationship. In fact, Sunday, it was after Trevino gave Higashioka some advice on his swing that he finally found the power the Yankees had been expecting. In his 101st plate appearance of the season, Higashioka hit his first home runs of the season in the Yankees’ 18-4 blowout at the Stadium. In the eighth inning, he hit another.
“I mean, I’ve been I’ve been grinding all year trying to look for that adjustment to get back to where I know I could be, but I actually got some good advice from Trevi in the in the dugout after my first at-bat and for some reason, it just clicked everything into place,” Higashioka said with a laugh. “So I want to kind of give credit to my man Trevi.”
Higashioka said Trevino noticed something with his lower half that helped him adjust.
He was always considered a defense-first catcher, but was predicted to hit with power in the big leagues. After hitting 10 home runs last season, Higashioka has only an OPS of .505 this season. He’s slashing .172/.225/.280 in 93 at-bats this season.
Trevino has been hitting .440 over his last 18 games and had been earning more playing time. In fact, Trevino was a late scratch because of a back issue Sunday.
“Both of our main goals are to just win every single game that we play. So whether we’re playing or on the bench we’re trying to help each other to have as good a game possible defensively and offensively,” Higashioka said. “So that we can win as many games as possible and at the end of the year, we should be where we want to be.”
Higashioka’s second home run came off Cubs first baseman Frank Schwindel on a 35.1 mph pitch. It was the slowest pitch ever to have a home run hit on it in MLB history
“That was pretty funny,” Higashioka said.
TAILON TERRIFIC
Jameson Taillon recorded his MLB-lead-tying seventh win of the season Sunday. He allowed three earned runs on seven hits and one walk. He has allowed one walk or fewer in each of his 12 starts this season and 14 straight dating back to Sept. 28, 2021, the longest such streak in franchise history. Sunday, Taillon was disappointed that he didn’t get beyond five innings.
“It’s interesting. Definitely waiting in between innings is probably the most impactful thing,” Taillon said of pitching in such a lopsided game. “Just making sure you’re ready to go for the next inning and on your game. It was kind of fighting a battle in my head. Sometimes it’s like, man, should I throw a 3-2 changeup here or should I just challenge you guys with heaters?”
SUNDAY SCRATCHES
Trevino and Gleyber Torres were scratched from Sunday’s lineup. The catcher has a back issue and Torres felt ill before the game.
“He had actually played with it last night and obviously played very well with it, but he’s got a little back thing going on and came in with it still lingering today,” Aaron Boone said of Trevino.