Yankees: Don’t look now, but someone’s gaining on us

The Yankees stumble into Toronto having lost two of three to the Orioles at Camden Yards. The standings still show the team in first place, but once again the Yankees need to shift into a higher gear to hold that position.

The Yankees sheepishly left Baltimore last night trying to explain how and why Masahiro Tanaka looked as bad as he did in a 10-4 loss to the Orioles.

The Orioles are not the Oakland A’s, who Tanaka was able to bury in his last start against a lineup that was swinging at anything close to the plate. And maybe that’s part of the problem. But there has to be more to it. And there is.

Masahiro Tanaka is tired. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. Tanaka has been pitching at this level since he was eighteen years old and he has ten years of throwing split-finger fastballs, a pitch that some say creates the greatest possibility of injury for a pitcher.

The pitch was not effective last night, and neither was Tanaka, who gave up seven runs in only 5.2 innings. Significantly, he threw only 60 percent of his pitches for strikes (100-60) and managed to throw first-pitch strikes to only half the batters he faced (27-14).

And that’s not the way you win games against a lineup that includes Manny Machado, Mark Trumbo, and Chris Davis.

Tanaka needs that extra day of rest he is accustomed to. How many times do I have to say it?

The Yankees have other things to worry about

Beyond Tanaka though, the Yankees have more heady things to be concerned about. And number one on their list is the upcoming series against the Toronto Blue Jays.

You’ll recall that most writers and fans if they didn’t pick the Red Sox, went with the Blue Jays as the team to win the American League East.

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And then the season began, and the Blue Jays got off to a horrific start going something like 1-8, and then it got even worse. Well, don’t look now but they are only one game under .500 at 26-27, and very quietly, have become one of the hottest teams in baseball, having won eight of the last ten games.

We’ve come to learn that a baseball season is a rollercoaster ride with teams doing imitations of Jekyll and Hyde over the long haul. And what goes up, as with the Yankees in April, must come down.

And while it would be foolish to say the Yankees are in a “down” mode now, they do need to take stock of the fact that the American League East is going to be the dogfight that everyone predicted it would be.

It doesn’t get easier

No doubt, when Joe Girardi looked at the Yankees schedule at the beginning of the season, he could easily point to this stretch of games as a make or break point for the team. The four games in Toronto are followed by, get this, the Red Sox for three, the Orioles again for three, and then that time-altering dreaded trip to the West Coast.

Next: Four players with value who could be traded

The good news if you are Brian Cashman, though, is that by the end of that portion of the schedule he will know with certainty who the Yankees are this season, one way or the other. And from there, he can decide the direction he needs to take the team as the trade deadline approaches.

CC Sabathia opens the series in Toronto tonight. Let the games begin.