NEW YORK — Julian Merryweather had to get used to fans in the stands, having debuted last summer in an empty ballpark. He was surprised the 10th inning started with a runner on second.
No matter. The Toronto Blue Jays turned Yankee Stadium as silent as it was during a 2020 season played without fans.
Randal Grichuk led off the 10th with an RBI double, Merryweather struck out the side on 11 pitches in the bottom half, and the Blue Jays took advantage of the second year of COVID-era rule starting starting extra innings with a runner on to beat New York 3-2 Thursday in the major league opener.
“It was definitely weird,” Merryweather said. “I asked a few people: What are all these people doing here? Who are these people? But it was great to have fans again.. … the moment itself, being in Yankee Stadium was pretty surreal. That’s like Little League dreams right there.”
Merryweather felt energy from the fans. But he didn’t realize the runner on second in extras rule returned until bullpen coach Matt Buschmann told him.
“I forgot,” Merryweather recalled. “Oh God, there’s going to be a runner on second.”
He fanned Aaron Hicks and Giancarlo Stanton on three pitches each, started Gleyber Torres with two strikes, then threw a ball and got a foul before getting him to swing past a 99 mph offering.
“I’m definitely calling my mom,” the 29-year-old right-hander said. “She’s probably called me five times freaking out.”
Merryweather was acquired in the 2018 trade that sent star third baseman Josh Donaldson to Cleveland. Now with Minnesota, Donaldson left the Twins’ season opener with hamstring tightness on Thursday.
Teoscar Hernández tied the score in the sixth inning with a 437-foot homer on a hanging slider from Yankees ace Gerrit Cole, whose parents were in the crowd to watch him in person in at Yankee Stadium for the first time with New York.
“I just want that slider back,” said Cole, who slapped his glove against the bench four times after he came out.
Fans had not been at Yankee Stadium for 532 days since the loss to Houston in Game 5 of the AL Championship Series on Oct. 18, 2019. They had to show proof of complete vaccination at least two weeks earlier or a recent negative COVID-19 test. Masks were required, and groups were separated by empty seats into pods.
“Obviously it didn’t end the way you want to where you’re shaking hands, but it definitely was special having a crowd back,’” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “Even though we’re 20% capacity, you could feel their energy and feel them waiting to erupt.”
Attendance was announced as 10,850. Before its first homestand at its spring training ballpark in Dunedin, Florida — the Canadian government won’t allow the Blue Jays to play at home due to coronavirus restrictions — Toronto plays Monday in the home opener of Texas, the only big league ballpark allowed 100% capacity at the season’s start.
“That’s going to be exciting because we all are going to feel normal playing the game that we love,” Hernández said. “Getting fans back on the field as it was three, four years ago, it makes us really good because the game is going back to normal.”
Cole, starting the second season of his $324 million, nine-year deal, allowed two runs and five hits in 5 1/3 innings with eight strikeouts and two starts. He fell behind on Lourdes Gurriel Jr.’s RBI single in the second.
Toronto’s Hyun Jin Ryu gave up four hits in 5 1/3 innings, including Gary Sánchez’s two-run homer in the second.
David Phelps escaped a bases-loaded jam in the seventh by getting Aaron Judge to ground into an inning-ending double play.
Jordan Romano of Markham, Ont., (1-0) escaped trouble in the ninth with the help of third baseman Cavan Biggio. After pinch-runner Michael Tauchman stole two bases, he was thrown out at the plate by Biggio trying to score on a grounder by AL batting champion DJ LeMahieu. Romano struck out Judge to strand two runners.
Nick Nelson (0-1) relieved to begin the 10th and with pinch-runner Jonathan Davis on second, allowed Grichuk’s double.
On an afternoon with a game time temperature of 43 degrees, the Yankees played their first extra-innings opener since 1987.
A reduced group of Bleacher Creatures shouted the Roll Call from the right-field seats in the top of the first, and first baseman Jay Bruce raised his right arm in a spirited response. Cole turned to the bleachers to survey the scene when Biggio’s foul ball provided a momentary break.
“Having that buzz, having the energy back in the Stadium was something special,” Judge said. “I was talking with a couple guys, talking with the umpires, everybody missed it. Those fans, that energy, that makes the game.”
A fan tried to grab the ball from Judge’s glove when he caught Rowdy Tellez’s foul fly for the final out of the ninth.
“It’s their first game back at the Stadium, in a long time,” Judge said. “So I’ll give them that one.”
100
Toronto’s Charlie Montoyo got his 100th win as a manager league manager.
MOVING ACROSS THE DIAMOND
Marcus Semien, making his Blue Jays’ debut, made a diving stop in his first game at second base since Sept. 26, 2014, and threw out LeMahieu for the final out of the fifth with two on.
TRAINER’S ROOM
Yankees 1B Luke Voit used a cane during the introductions following knee surgery Monday.
UP NEXT
RHP Corey Kluber, a two-time AL Cy Young Award winner limited to one inning during the last two seasons due to injuries, makes his Yankees debut Saturday. RHP Ross Stripling starts for the Blue Jays.
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GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Canada’s Marina Stakusic fell 6-4, 6-3 to Poland’s Magdalena Frech in the quarterfinals of the Guadalajara Open tennis tournament on Friday.
The 19-year-old from Mississauga, Ont., won 61 per cent of her first-serve points and broke on just one of her six opportunities.
Stakusic had upset top-seeded Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (0) on Thursday night to advance.
In the opening round, Stakusic defeated Slovakia’s Anna Karolína Schmiedlová 6-2, 6-4 on Tuesday.
The fifth-seeded Frech won 62 per cent of her first-serve points and converted on three of her nine break point opportunities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
TORONTO – Alejandro Kirk’s long single with the bases loaded provided the Toronto Blue Jays with a walk-off 4-3 win in the 11th inning of their series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday.
With the Cardinals outfield in, Kirk drove a shot off the base of the left-field wall to give the Blue Jays (70-78) their fourth win in 11 outings and halt the Cardinals’ (74-73) two-game win streak before 30,380 at Rogers Centre.
Kirk enjoyed a two-hit, two-RBI outing.
Erik Swanson (2-2) pitched a perfect 11th inning for the win, while Cardinals reliever Ryan Fernandez (1-5) took the loss.
Blue Jays starter Kevin Gausman enjoyed a seven-inning, 104-pitch outing. He surrendered his two runs on nine hits and two walks and fanned only two Cardinals.
He gave way to reliever Genesis Cabrera, who gave up a one-out homer to Thomas Saggese, his first in 2024, that tied the game in the eighth.
The Cardinals started swiftly with four straight singles to open the game. But they exited the first inning with only two runs on an RBI single to centre from Nolan Arendao and a fielder’s choice from Saggese.
Gausman required 28 pitches to escape the first inning but settled down to allow his teammates to snatch the lead in the fourth.
He also deftly pitched out of threats from the visitors in the fifth, sixth and seventh thanks to some solid defence, including Will Wagner’s diving stop, which led to a double play to end the fifth inning.
George Springer led off with a walk and stole second base. He advanced to third on Nathan Lukes’s single and scored when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. knocked in his 95th run with a double off the left-field wall.
Lukes scored on a sacrifice fly to left field from Spencer Horwitz. Guerrero touched home on Kirk’s two-out single to right.
In the ninth, Guerrero made a critical diving catch on an Arenado grounder to throw out the Cardinals’ infielder, with reliever Tommy Nance covering first. The defensive gem ended the inning with a runner on second base.
St. Louis starter Erick Fedde faced the minimum night batters in the first three innings thanks to a pair of double plays. He lasted five innings, giving up three runs on six hits and a walk with three strikeouts.
ON DECK
Toronto ace Jose Berrios (15-9) will start the second of the three-game series on Saturday. He has a six-game win streak.
The Cardinals will counter with righty Kyle Gibson (8-6).
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
CALGARY – Mired in their first four-game losing skid in 20 years, the Calgary Stampeders are going back to Jake Maier at quarterback on Saturday after he was benched for a game.
It won’t be an easy assignment.
Visiting McMahon Stadium are the Eastern Conference-leading Montreal Alouettes (10-2) who own the CFL’s best record. The Stampeders (4-8) have fallen to last in the Western Conference.
“Six games is plenty of time, but also it is just six games,” said Maier. “We’ve got to be able to get on the right track.”
Calgary is in danger of missing the playoffs for the first time since 2004.
“I do still believe in this team,” said Stampeders’ head coach and general manager Dave Dickenson. “I want to see improvement, though. I want to see guys on a weekly basis elevating their game, and we haven’t been doing that.”
Maier is one of the guys under the microscope. Two weeks ago, the second-year starter threw four interceptions in a 35-20 home loss to the Edmonton Elks.
After his replacement, rookie Logan Bonner, threw five picks in last week’s 37-16 loss to the Elks in Edmonton, the football is back in Maier’s hands.
“Any time you fail or something doesn’t go your way in life, does it stink in the moment? Yeah. But then the days go on and you learn things about yourself and you learn how to prepare a little bit better,” said Maier. “It makes you mentally tougher.”
Dickenson wants to see his quarterback making better decisions with the football.
“Things are going to happen, interceptions will happen, but try to take calculated risks, rather than just putting the ball up there and hoping that we catch it,” said Dickenson.
A former quarterback himself, he knows the importance of that vital position.
“You cannot win without good quarterback play,” Dickenson said. “You’ve got to be able to make some plays — off-schedule plays, move-around plays, plays that break down, plays that aren’t designed perfectly, but somehow you found the right guy, and then those big throws where you’re taking that hit.”
But it’s going to take a team effort, and that includes the club’s receiving corp.
“We always have to band together because we need everything to go right for our receivers to get the ball,” said Nik Lewis, the Stampeders’ receivers coach. “The running back has to pick up the blitz, the o-line has to block, the quarterback has to make the right reads, and then give us a catchable ball.”
Lewis brings a unique perspective to this season’s frustrations as he was a 22-year-old rookie in Calgary in 2004 when the Stamps went 4-14 under coach Matt Dunigan. They turned it around the next season and haven’t missed the playoffs since.”
“Thinking back and just looking at it, there’s just got to be an ultimate belief that you can get it done. Look at Montreal, they were 6-7 last year and they’ve gone 18-2 since then,” said Lewis.
Montreal is also looking to rebound from a 37-23 loss to the B.C. Lions last week. But for head coach Jason Maas, he says his team’s mindset doesn’t change, regardless of what happened the previous week.
“Last year when we went through a four-game losing streak, you couldn’t tell if we were on a four-game winning streak or a four-game losing streak by the way the guys were in the building, the way we prepared, the type of work ethic we have,” said Maas. “All our standards are set, so that’s all we focus on.”
While they may have already clinched a playoff spot, Alouettes’ quarterback Cody Fajardo says this closing stretch remains critical because they want to finish the season strong, just like last year when they won their final five regular-season games before ultimately winning the Grey Cup.
“It doesn’t matter about what you do at the beginning of the year,” said Fajardo. “All that matters is how you end the year and how well you’re playing going into the playoffs so that’s what these games are about.”
The Alouettes’ are kicking off a three-game road stretch, one Fajardo looks forward to.
“You understand what kind of team you have when you play on the road because it’s us versus the world mentality and you can feel everybody against you,” said Fajardo. “Plus, I always tend to find more joy in silencing thousands of people than bringing thousands of people to their feet.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
