For the Yankees, every game left in the regular season is essentially a playoff game, as Sunday night’s loss to the Mets left the Yankees one game behind in the AL Wild Card race.
The team has 19 games left over the next three weeks, the final nine of which include three each with the division-leading Rays and Wild Card-leading Red Sox and Blue Jays. The first man up on the mound for the Yankees in that stretch is Luis Gil, who lasted just 3 1/3 innings and walked seven – the most by a Yankees starter in over a decade – in his last outing against Toronto.
“When you talk about my last outing, overall, I think the learning experience was highly important,” Gil said through team translator Marlon Abreu on Sunday. “It’s bad that you have to go through an outing like that where things don’t go the way you want, but there’s a lot to learn from it.”
"He's a confident kid, so I'm not worried about the way he bounces back from a mental standpoint," manager Aaron Boone added prior to Monday's game.
Gil’s learning experience this go-round? Cleaning up some mechanics and delivery.
“It’s definitely about mechanics. On the mound if one little thing isn’t working, it will be tough for you to find the strike zone. That’s the work you have to do in between starts to find the right rhythm,” he said. “It was important for us to work on my delivery and making it more consistent, because if I’m more consistent, I’ll be around the zone more.”
Control was an issue for in the minors for Gil, who has walked 5.2 batters per nine innings over his minor league career. He was much better in his first three MLB starts, walking seven in 15 2/3 innings (a ratio of 4.02 per nine), but doubled that total against Toronto.
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His opponents have gotten progressively tougher, from Baltimore to Seattle to Boston to Toronto, but Gil has at least one more turn in the rotation if not more before the regular season ends, so the pressure is on no matter who the opponent may be – even if, for him, it’s Minnesota and then likely Cleveland next up.
Gil, to his credit, isn’t worried about cracking under it.
“I feel I’m prepared physically and mentally for the task, and the way I see it, it’s about executing one pitch at a time, making sure I can throw strikes at the right time,” he said. “I think that’s the best way for me to encounter what I want to encounter.”
"Pound the strike zone," Aaron Boone added. "If he's around the strike zone, he's gonna be tough, because he has an elite fastball and good solid secondary stuff."
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