The LoHud Yankees Blog

YANKEES (75-47)
Derek Jeter SS
Nick Swisher RF
Mark Teixeira 1B
Robinson Cano 2B
Marcus Thames DH
Jorge Posada C
Austin Kearns LF
Curtis Granderson CF
Eduardo Nunez 3B

RHP Javier Vazquez (9-9, 4.89)
Vazquez vs. Mariners

MARINERS (49-73)
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Chone Figgins 2B
Russell Branyan DH
Jose Lopez 3B
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Casey Kotchman 1B
Josh Bard C
Michael Saunders LF
Josh Wilson SS

LHP Jason Vargas (9-5, 3.15)
Vargas vs. Yankees

TIME/TV: 1:05 p.m. / YES Network

UMPIRES: HP Brian Knight, 1B Sam Holbrook, 2B Gerry Davis, 3B Greg Gibson

WEATHER: Low 80s. Hardly any chance of rain. Little bit of a breeze blowing in.

LEFT ON LEFT: Robinson Cano hits lefties. We already know that. Against this particular lefty, Jason Vargas, he’s a career .714 hitter (5-for-7) with two doubles and no strikeouts. The guy he’s replacing in the clean-up spot, Alex Rodriguez, is 0-for-4 with two walks and a K against Vargas.

SPEAKING OF LEFTIES: The Yankees are 12-5 in this past 17 games against left-handed starters. Before this stretch, they were 12-12 against lefties.

ON TIME: The Yankees-Red Sox game on Saturday, Sept. 25 at Yankee Stadium, has been picked up by FOX and will begin at 4:10 p.m.

UPDATE, 1:12 p.m.: Vazquez’s third pitch of the game is the 36th lead-off home run of Ichiro’s career.

UPDATE, 1:14 p.m.: Whoa. Branyan just went into the upper deck with his third home run in two days. I honestly can’t believe how far he hit it. Television had the Vazquez fastball at 86 mph. The stadium gun has him ranging between 84 and 88.

UPDATE, 1:28 p.m.: Robinson Cano picks up Vazquez with a two-run single in the bottom of the first. The game’s tied at 2.

UPDATE, 1:32 p.m.: Jorge Posada’s 14th home run of the season is a two-run shot to left, and it’s enough for  4-2 Yankees lead. Still in the first inning.

UPDATE, 1:41 p.m.: After a fairly routine fly ball round a hole for a two-base hit to start the second inning, Vazquez got out of it with three straight outs, one of them on a terrific play by Teixeira at first.

UPDATE, 1:45 p.m.: Thought Nunez had his first big league hit for sure. Nice play by Wilson to take it away.

UPDATE, 1:50 p.m.: Ichiro’s second swing is his second home run of the game. He has just five homers all year.

UPDATE, 2:00 p.m.: With two outs in the third, four straight Seattle batters have reached base. Chad Gaudin is getting loose in the bullpen. The game is tied at 4.

UPDATE, 2:10 p.m.: That’s it for Vazquez. A lead-off infield single is enough to chase him from the game in the fourth inning. Gaudin is now pitching.

UPDATE, 2:45 p.m.: Terrific job by Gaudin. He’s pitched three scoreless innings, allowing just one hit. He’s carried the game into the seventh inning. If this is as far as he goes, he’s certainly done his job. The rest of the bullpen should be able to handle it from here.

UPDATE, 2:57 p.m.: Boone Logan is in for Gaudin to begin the seventh. Really nice job by Gaudin. He’s one of the reasons the Yankees don’t need to rush Alfredo Aceves back into the mix. With Gaudin and Mitre pitching well, the Yankees don’t absolutely have to have another multi-inning reliever.

UPDATE, 3:11 p.m.: The entire Yankees bench came to the front of the dugout to cheer Eduardo Nunez’s first big league hit. It was an important one, a single through the right side of the infield that scored Austin Kearns from third base and put the Yankees in front 5-4.

UPDATE, 3:19 p.m.: And there’s an RBI single by the Captain. That makes it 6-4 with Logan in line for the win.

UPDATE, 3:24 p.m.: Teixeira’s sac fly makes it 7-4 before the end of the inning. Ramiro Pena is in for Nunez to play third base. Brett Gardner is in for Kearns to play left. Swisher is staying in the game in right. Jeter is staying in the game at short. Dave Robertson is pitching.

UPDATE, 3:35 p.m.: Girardi’s not messing around here. He’s bringing Rivera in with two outs and two on in the eighth. Robertson pitched well. He struck out two, but a hit batter and a bloop single put him in a little bit of trouble.

UPDATE, 3:51 p.m.: Casey Kotchman was just charged with an error, his first since 2008. It snapped the longest error-less streak of all time at first base. The Yankees are now in front 9-4.

Javier Vazquez has not thrown the ball hard all season. His fastball velocity has been steadily dropping the past four years, and on his best days Vazquez now throws his fastball at 89-90 mph. He might — might — touch 91.

“I think it’s back to where it was when he was winning a lot of games,” Joe Girardi said. “This has only become an issue because he stopped winning games. He won like eight out of ten starts (actually eight of 11 decisions) and his velocity was 88 to 89. At times it was 85 to 86. Then when he lost a couple, people started talking about his velocity. You can make something out of nothing, but his velocity had not been 91 to 93 all year long. To me, to get caught up in that is kind of silly. The bottom line is you have to make your pitches. You have to locate. If you do that at 82 (mph) you’re going to get people out.”

Yesterday, Vazquez was saying the same thing. He’s had some games when his velocity dipped into the mid-80s — his start in Texas for example — and those numbers bothered him, but he was back up to 88-90 in his most recent start. Vazquez has learned to work with the diminished velocity. What’s bothered him lately has been command.

“I was pitching well,” he said. “I was locating well. That’s why I say that the important thing is to locate. Obviously it would be great to be throwing harder, but the bottom line is I was locating well back then. That’s what I was doing… Those couple of games I was really low, that was my main concern was it not going lower, but it came back. I was 88 to 90 last time out, and the arm felt good. If I’m locating, I’ve got the other pitches to work with.”

• Girardi said every indication was that Alex Rodriguez would be ready to play yesterday. “His batting practice sessions, he went at it pretty hard those two days in the cage and said he felt tremendous,” Girardi said. “He felt explosion and everything. It’s just hard to say (what caused the setback), and it’s something we’re going to have to monitor and continue to go day-by-day.”

• Girard said it’s possible Rodriguez will not play in the upcoming series against Toronto, but he didn’t rule it out completely. “The turf is hard on him anyway,” Girardi said. “Maybe we get him as a DH one day or something.”

• Hard not to notice that the Yankees suddenly seem better equipped to handle left-handed starters. Austin Kearns and Marcus Thames loom large in these games. “I think our lineup is a little bit different with the people we’ve added,” Girardi said. “Getting a healthy Marcus back has helped as well. We were without him for about four weeks. He was a guy that we brought here to play against lefties. It definitely has increased our options.”

• Brett Gardner just has a regular day off. No injury or anything like that.

• Eduardo Nunez opened some eyes in spring training and will make his first major league start this afternoon. We saw a kid that was very talented,” Girardi said. “Liked his hands. Loved his arm, his range. He can run. He finds a way to put the bat on the ball. We believe that he can be an exciting player.”

• I’m not the only one who had a hard time getting here today. A lot of players were talking about the construction around the stadium that made getting to the park tough this morning. It was optional batting practice today, so guys were just kind of filtering in and out.

UPDATE, 12:31 p.m.: Mariners lineup
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Chone Figgins 2B
Russell Branyan DH
Jose Lopez 3B
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Casey Kotchman 1B
Josh Bard C
Michael Saunders LF
Josh Wilson SS

Associated Press photo of Vazquez

Joe Girardi said he hasn’t talked to Alex Rodriguez today, and his expectations have not changed since last night. Girardi does not expect Rodriguez to end up on the DL, but he doesn’t expect him to play the next few days either.

“I don’t expect him to play this series,” Girardi said. “And I’m not sure he’ll even play in Toronto.”

Fair warning to anyone driving to the game from the White Plains area: Even allowing for the expected traffic, it took me more than twice as long as usual to drive to the stadium this morning. Not good at all.

Derek Jeter SS
Nick Swisher RF
Mark Teixeira 1B
Robinson Cano 2B
Marcus Thames DH
Jorge Posada C
Austin Kearns LF
Curtis Granderson CF
Eduardo Nunez 3B

The news was a little bit buried in the middle of last night’s game: The Yankees announced that Zach McAllister had been traded to the Indians as the player to be named later in the Austin Kearns deal.

My first reaction was absolute surprise. That’s a big name to be a PTBNL. McAllister is still just 22 years old and already has a full season of Triple-A under his belt. He had outstanding numbers in Double-A last year, and Baseball America ranked him the Yankees No. 5 prospect this winter. It’s not often a guy like that is traded away as a player to be named.

Twelve hours later, it’s less stunning.

Outside of spring training, I only saw McAllister pitch first-hand once. He came up for the Triple-A playoffs last year and more than held his own. He was never a guy who seemed to wow anyone with his stuff, but the results spoke for themselves. It wasn’t a fluke that he wound up so high on Baseball America’s list. He’s a better pitcher than this year’s 5.09 ERA in Scranton/Wilkes-Barre suggests.

That said, Ivan Nova clearly moved ahead of McAllister in the Yankees rotation the pecking order. David Phelps, Hector Noesi and Andrew Brackman — probably Adam Warren and maybe Lance Pendleton too — seemed to have passed him among the Yankees upper-level pitching prospects. Manny Banuelos, Dellin Betances and Graham Stoneburner had clearly done the same in the lower levels.

The Yankees needed to protect McAllister from the Rule 5 draft this winter, and given such pitching depth, it might have been tough to find a spot for him on the 40-man. Don’t be surprised if he develops into a legit major league starter, but there’s enough pitching in the Yankees system that they could afford to lose him.

Alex Rodriguez said the tightness he felt tonight was roughly the same as the tightness he felt on Monday when he first injured his left calf. This was the first time he’d been back in the lineup — though he had taken batting practice for three straight days — and he felt that familiar discomfort when he swung in his first at-bat.

“Just felt something on my swing,” he said. “Might have been my swing. Probably my first step out of the box… I wouldn’t say it’s any worse. I think it’s probably the same. I didn’t run fast enough or do any violent move to make it worse.”

Joe Girardi has been notoriously protective of his players. Even given the setbacks to Rodriguez and Andy Pettitte, it’s hard for me to accuse him of rushing his players back from injuries.

“I talked to Alex. I talked to our trainers. I talked to our doctors,” he said. ” “Everyone felt that he was ready to go. We thought today was the day, and obviously it wasn’t.”

Girardi said he did not know of any additional tests planned for Rodriguez and said he doesn’t expect Rodriguez to go on the disabled list.

“I’ve never had a calf situation before so it’s hard to gauge what you can play through or what you can endure,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t know (about the disabled list). I’m just trying to play and do the best I can. It’s obviously not my decision.”

The Rodriguez audio is pretty much limited to the quotes I’ve already posted. Here’s Girardi’s postgame instead.

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• Obviously A.J. Burnett’s outing wasn’t good — “I gave up six runs. They have every right to boo,” he said — but it was surprisingly how many balls he kept on the ground and how many of the Mariners hits were singles. Of the 12 Mariners hits, only the Russell Branyan homers went for extra bases. Only four of Burnett’s outs got the outfield.

• Pitchers rarely sweat singles no matter how many there are, and Burnett was no different. “I gave up two hard-hit balls,” he said. “If those balls don’t leave the park it’s a 2-0 game. Those are the only two pitches I’m worried about.”

• Those two pitches: A bad curveball over the middle of the plate and a fastball that was supposed to be inside.

• Felix Heranandez is the fourth Mariners pitcher to beat the Yankees three times in a season. The others are Bill Kreuger (1991), Jeff Nelson (1995) and Jeff Fassero (1997). That’s according to Elias. I did not know that off the top of my head.

• “Nothing’s really straight,” Curtis Granderson said. “Today in all three of my at-bats I had two balls that I could have done something with. I didn’t get an opportunity to do anything with them, and so you start eliminating the opportunity to get good pitches to drive.”

• Austin Kearns extended his hitting streak to nine games, his longest of the season.

• Burnett threw a season-high 122 pitches. He also matched a career high of 12 hits allowed, which he’s done five times.

• The Yankees were 0-for-7 with runners in scoring position.

• Girardi said he pinch hit Marcus Thames in the ninth inning because he wanted to give Thames an at-bat against lefty Garrett Olson. The Yankees have a bunch of left-handers coming up.

• One last thing to keep in mind about Rodriguez’s injury: The Yankees next series is on that turf in Toronto. “Our listen to our medical people,” Girardi said. “That’s all I can do.”

Associated Press photos of Derek Jeter and Burnett. Didn’t see an A-Rod pictures after tonight’s game.

Even before tonight’s game, Alex Rodriguez had taken batting practice the past two days and felt good afterward. The training staff gave Joe Girardi the green light to put him in the lineup, and Rodriguez came through BP with no problems.

In his first at-bat — Rodriguez said it was either on the swing or as he stepped out of the box — he felt a pull in his calf. It was more or less the same feeling he had on Monday.

“He’s probably going to miss a few more games,” Girardi said.

I’ll have more after I get my newspaper stuff finished, but Girardi indicated that he does not expect Rodriguez to go on the disabled list. Rodriguez said he’s not sure what to think because he’s never had a calf injury in the past. He can’t tell what’s an acceptable level of discomfort.

Felix Hernandez has faced the Yankees three times this season. This was the first time he didn’t pitch a complete game. Hernandez struck out 11 through eight dominant innings, beating the Yankees 6-0 to end their three-game winning streak. The Yankees had no more answers today than in their previous games against Hernandez, and A.J. Burnett was roughed up for six runs, half of which came before he recorded an out.

Associated Press photo of Burnett

YANKEES (75-46)
Brett Gardner LF
Derek Jeter SS
Mark Teixeira 1B
Alex Rodriguez DH
Robinson Cano 2B
Nick Swisher RF
Curtis Granderson CF
Francisco Cervelli C
Ramiro Pena 3B

RHP A.J. Burnett (9-10, 4.66)
Burnett vs. Mariners

MARINERS (48-73)
Ichiro Suzuki RF
Chone Figgins 2B
Russell Branyan DH
Jose Lopez 3B
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Casey Kotchman 1B
Adam Moore C
Matt Tuiasosopo LF
Josh Wilson SS

RHP Felix Hernandez (8-10, 2.62)
Hernandez vs. Yankees

TIME/TV: 7:05 p.m. / YES Network

UMPIRES: HP Greg Gibson, 1B Brian Knight, 2B Sam Holbrook, 3B Gerry Davis

WEATHER: Really nice night here in the Bronx. Very, very light breeze. Blue sky. Not too hot. It’s a good night.

BETTER THAN EXPECTED: The Yankees have struggled against Felix Hernandez this season — actually, struggled might not be strong enough — but individually, they’ve been solid against him. Mark Teixeira is a career .326 hitter with three homers in 43 at-bats against the Mariners ace. Curtis Granderson is a career .344 hitter, Robinson Cano is a .300 hitter and Derek Jeter is a .316 hitter against King Felix. Only Nick Swisher has more than 13 at-bats against Hernandez with a lower than .300 career average.

FINALLY, RUNS: The Yankees have scored 20 runs in the past three games. That’s after scoring 22 runs in their previous six games.

YOUNG GUN: With yesterday’s win, Phil Hughes has 15 wins a little more than a month after his 24th birthday. According to Elias, Hughes is the second Yankees pitcher in the past 35 years to win 15 games in a season before turning 25. The first was Andy Pettitte in 1996.

HOME SWEET HOME: At 40-21, the Yankees have the second-best home record in the majors. They’re tied with Philadelphia. Atlanta has the best home record at 44-17. Since moving into this stadium, the Yankees are 97-45 at home, the best home record in the majors in that time.

UPDATE, 7:15 p.m.: Zach McAllister is the player to be named later in the Austin Kearns trade. He’s on his way to the Indians organization.

UPDATE, 7:17 p.m.: Three-run home run by Russell Branyan. It’s a 3-0 Mariners lead before Burnett has recorded an out.

UPDATE, 7:55 p.m.: There are times Burnett looks terrific, and there are times when the Mariners seem able to hit him at will. He’s allowed two singles in each of the first three innings, and back-to-back two-out hits in the third have increased the Mariners lead to 4-0.

UPDATE, 8:14 p.m.: Two more singles and another run off Burnett. It’s 5-0 Seattle. The Yankees still don’t have a hit.

UPDATE, 8:20 p.m.: The crowd is booing Burnett in the fourth inning. He’s allowed three singles and just walked Jose Lopez to load the bases. With two outs, though, there’s no one getting loose in the bullpen.

UPDATE, 8:30 p.m.: Not usually a good sign when Austin Kearns is pinch hitting for Alex Rodriguez in the fourth inning.

UPDATE, 8:52 p.m.: Bases loaded with one out in the fifth, Hernandez struck out Pena and Gardner to stranded the runners and escape the jam.

UPDATE, 8:57 p.m.: Yankee Stadium is letting Burnett hear it after Branyan’s second homer of the game, a solo shot to center.

UPDATE, 9:24 p.m.: Seven of Hernandez’s past eight outs have been strikeouts, including four in a row. Every spot in the Yankees order has struck out at least once except the No. 2 hole where Derek Jeter is 1-for-3 without a K.

Robinson Cano has played in 120 games this season. He’s one home run away from a career-high, he long ago passed his career-high in walks and his on-base percentage is 41 points higher than his career OBP.

“This is just a different year,” Cano said. “I’m trying to put everything behind. Just go out there and swing at strikes and get something that I can drive.”

The amazing thing about that quote: It’s from April 7.

As a group of reporters huddled around Cano’s locker this afternoon, I couldn’t help but think back to March and April. Today we were asking about Cano’s three-day stint as the Yankees clean-up hitter. Back then we were asking how he felt to be trusted in the No. 5 spot.

“The game of baseball, you always have to keep improving and learning,” Cano said during spring training. “I feel like I’m one of the guys that has to keep learning and keep improving and show people that I can still play the game.”

Cano has put himself among the best hitters in the game, and he’s preached patience throughout. He’s talked about keeping things simple, about trying not to do too much. It’s the same thing player after player has said day after day, but Cano has lived it since spring training.

“To think that he wouldn’t tail off at some point is really hard to fathom,” Joe Girardi said. “In Alex’s absence, he’s stepped up to the four spot and done a tremendous job.”

• Alfredo Aceves will make another rehab start this weekend. He’ll make it in Portland, Maine, going three innings for Double-A Trenton. Girardi couldn’t remember whether the start would be Saturday or Sunday, but it’s likely Aceves will make at least one more before rejoining the big league bullpen.

“We’re not just considering Portland, Maine to be his last appearance,” Girardi said. “We have them spaced out. This is spring training for him, and we think he still needs to build some arm strength and get sharper. But I told him, if we feel there’s a need, we’ll call him back. I’m not saying we don’t want him back, but we want to make sure he’s ready before we call him back.”

• Andy Pettitte told reporters that he expects to travel with the team to Toronto next week. Girardi said that’s possible, but he hasn’t talked to anyone about Pettitte’s final plan for the week. “His plan has not changed,” Girardi said. “We were basically going to give him six or seven days off. It’s possible he’ll be accompanying us to Toronto.”

• Girardi’s not sure when Alex Rodriguez might play the field. “A lot of it depends on how he feels,” Girardi said. “It’s one thing to watch him and say he feels great, but he has to let me know when he feels he’s ready to go and play the infield.”

• The Yankees have gotten a few short outings from starters lately, and they’re in the middle of a lot of games in a row, but Girardi said he’s not worried about the bullpen workload. “We have two long men and we’ve been able to rest guys,” he said.

• Curtis Granderson went 6-for-13 in this week’s series against Detroit. “Ever since he’s made those slight adjustments with K-Long, we’ve seen much better at-bats and more consistent at-bats,” Girardi said. “And we’re excited about that.”

UPDATE, 6:12 p.m.: So far, no lineup changes for the Yankees. I have to think Rodriguez is staying in there. Here’s the Seattle lineup.

Ichiro Suzuki RF
Chone Figgins 2B
Russell Branyan DH
Jose Lopez 3B
Franklin Gutierrez CF
Casey Kotchman 1B
Adam Moore C
Matt Tuiasosopo LF
Josh Wilson SS

Associated Press photo of Cano