Blue Jays hammer Tanaka, Yankees drop series opener 8-1

Source: FanGraphs

There will be no postseason clincher Friday night. The Yankees were blown out 8-1 by the Blue Jays in the first game of their final road series of the regular season. The magic number remains two — it could still drop tonight depending what the Rangers and Angels do — and the Yankees are still 14-5 in their last 19 games. Let’s recap this loss with bullet points, because it was ugly and because it’s Friday night, and then let’s never talk of this game again:

• MasaHRo: Not a good outing for Masahiro Tanaka. Not at all. He gave up three home runs, all on hanging offspeed pitches and two in two-strike counts. The big blow: a grand slam by Ryan Goins. Ryan Goins! That’s like giving up a grand slam to Brendan Ryan. The Yankees were already down 4-1 at the time, so all the grand slam did was make it a laugher. Teoscar Hernandez (long solo homer) and Russell Martin (wall-scraping two-run shot) also took Tanaka deep. His final line: 5.2 IP, 6 H, 8 R, 7 ER, 3 BB, 6 K. Yuck.
• One & Done: The Yankees got off to a such a great start Friday night. Five pitches into the game they were up 1-0 on Aaron Judge’s 46th (*47th) home run of the season. It was a bomb too. The Yankees did not score again. Judge walked to start the fourth inning, but never moved from first. He doubled to start the seventh inning, but never moved from second. Judge went 2-for-2 with a homer, a double, and two walks. The rest of the Yankees went 1-for-27 (.037) with two walks. Gary Sanchez, to be fair, hit two rockets right at defenders.
• Leftovers: Tommy Kahnle, who was warmed up and ready to go when Tanaka served up the grand slam to Goins, struck out the only batter he faced. One batter too late, eh? … seven up, six down for mop-up men Jonathan Holder and Gio Gallegos … the one non-Judge hit was a third inning double by Todd Frazier, who then fell for the hidden ball trick at second base. Here’s the video. That kinda night.

Here are the box score, video highlights, updated standings, and postseason odds. Here’s out Bullpen Workload page. The Yankees and Blue Jays continue this three-game series Saturday afternoon. That’s a 4pm ET start. Sonny Gray and Joe Be-A-Genie are the scheduled starters. Will it be a postseason clincher? I hope. Would be cool.