The New York Yankees and the Toronto Blue Jays are in a battle for the American League East. The Yankees had been holding tightly to first place in the AL East, but after spending money at the trade deadline, the Blue Jays have taken over the top spot. The Yankees were quiet at the trade deadline and that is certainly showing as the team's offense has fallen flat over the past few weeks. Meanwhile Toronto is one of the hottest teams in baseball and they intend to keep up the trend.
The Yankees offense has been all but silent over the past few weeks. The team is simply not getting the production needed to remain in good standings for the postseason. There is optimism that it is just a small blip in the season, but New York will have real concerns if they cannot get a few wins from this series with Toronto. The Yankees have some tough calls to make in the next few weeks before the waiver deadline. They are dealing with struggles from Stephen Drew and Brendan Ryan that are plaguing the offense. New York could opt to trade for Chase Utley or Martin Prado or try and call up Rob Refsnyder to take over in the infield. This series with the Blue Jays could be very telling as to what the team does.
Pitching is starting to improve and much of that can be credited to Masahiro Tanaka who takes the mound against Toronto. He took a loss in his last start against the Blue Jays while giving up two runs and three hits and getting no run support. He gave up solo home runs in the two runs. The Yankees need him to be lights out against Toronto this time around in case the offense simply cannot match production.
The Blue Jays continue to win games after adding players like David Price. The Blue Jays are now on an 11-game win streak while having swept the Oakland Athletics, Yankees and Twins while winning three of four against the Kansas City Royals. Marco Estrada will take the mound to keep the success going. He got a win against the Yankees the last time around while not offering up any runs and just three hits over six innings. It was the team's second consecutive shut out over Toronto as they hope to keep the momentum alive and moving in the weekend series.