The Yankees’ playoffs hopes are dwindling by the day, but Kyle Higashioka hasn’t lost his sense of humor.
The Bombers’ catcher was asked what his emotions were after the Yankees’ latest loss, a 5-2 defeat to the rival Tampa Bay Rays on Tuesday night in The Bronx.
“I really don’t have a ton of emotions, so…” Higashioka said, drawing laughs from reporters, “this would be my mood, even if we got, like, [Shohei] Ohtani.”
After Higashioka — who went 0-for-3 with a strikeout in the loss — delivered the deadpan delivery, he looked both ways at reporters with a straight face, drawing more laughs from the assembled media.
Good humor aside, the Yankees are now 55-52 and remain 3 1/2 games behind the Toronto Blue Jays in the battle for the final American League wild-card spot.
Making matters worse, the Red Sox, Mariners and Angels are also ahead of the Bombers in the wild-card race.
The Yankees’ offense struggled again, mustering just seven hits and two runs in the loss.
“Like we’ve been saying all week and the past couple days, it’s on us as players,” Aaron Judge said after the Yankees’ latest defeat. “We’re fully capable with the guys we got in this room to go out and compete on a daily basis. The results haven’t come, obviously all year, but we still got two months left in the season and we got a lot of work to do.
“We gotta step up in this room and keep moving forward.”
They are just 1-4 to start a key 10-game stretch where they are facing the Baltimore Orioles, the Rays and the Houston Astros.
The Yankees made just two minor moves for two pitchers (reliever Kenyan Middleton and right-hander Spencer Howard) before the trade deadline, possibly due to the fact they had been struggling in this key stretch, even before Tuesday’s loss.
General manager Brian Cashman said the Yankees were initially “opportunistic buyers” and “opportunistic sellers,” but then when the team stumbled out of the gates in the second half, they “became more cautious buyers.”
Emotions aside, if the Yankees’ offense remains dormant, they will be on the outside looking in when the MLB playoffs start.