NEW YORK — Aaron Judge stood on second base with his arms outstretched, his massive wingspan hard to miss. The next pitch from Max Scherzer was a changeup down in the zone that Yankees left-handed Ben Rice spat on.
Judge repeated his gesture on the next pitch and Rice drilled Scherzer’s changeup deep into the stands in right field, yet just to the wrong side of the foul pole.
Blue Jays first baseman Ty France then jogged to the mound to alert Scherzer on what had been happening: He’d almost certainly been tipping his changeup to the New York Yankees.
Rice proceeded to foul off a fastball and curveball from Scherzer before sending the 10th pitch of the at-bat, a four-seamer in the middle of the zone, over the right-field fence. The three-run shot left his bat at 109.4 m.p.h. and gave the Yankees the lead in the first inning of Sunday’s game.
The strategy and accompanying home run didn’t stand as the game-winner — the Blue Jays tied the game before Scherzer eventually surrendered a third-inning double to Cody Bellinger that put the Yankees up for good — but it did offer a strong dose of gamesmanship in New York’s 4-3 win over Toronto in front of 43,266 at Yankee Stadium.
The Blue Jays (82-61) dropped two of three over the weekend series and now sit just two games ahead of the Yankees (80-63) in the American League East. This marked the last time these clubs will meet in the regular season — the Blue Jays finished with an 8-5 record — however, a meeting in the playoffs is a real possibility.
Not to put the cart before the horse, as Blue Jays manager John Schneider likes to say, but if the post-season began today, Toronto would receive a bye to the AL Division Series, where they would play winner of the wild-card matchup between the Yankees and Boston Red Sox.
Should that happen, don’t forget what happened with Scherzer. There’s plenty of intrigue between these clubs.
The Yankees grinded out at-bats against Scherzer, pushing up his pitch count and making him work right from the eventful first inning. The right-hander allowed four runs on three hits and four walks over 4.1 innings, with eight strikeouts on 93 pitches.
Blue Jays shortstop Bo Bichette was not in the lineup on Sunday after cutting up his shin while sliding into home plate in Saturday’s game and the club certainly missed his presence.
After Vladimir Guerrero Jr.’s hard-hit double plated the tying run in the third inning, the Blue Jays put runners on second and third with none out. However, Yankees left-hander Max Fried kept the ball in the infield, retiring Alejandro Kirk — batting in Bichette’s No. 4 spot — along with Ernie Clement and Ty France to escape further damage.
The Blue Jays again put two runners on in the eighth inning but failed to score against Yankees reliever Devin Williams.
