Yankees, Blue Jays in need of jolt on offense in series opener

Both teams will be out to revive their sluggish bats on Friday night when the New York Yankees visit the Toronto Blue Jays to open a three-game series.

Toronto and New York were blanked in home games on Thursday. The Blue Jays were going for a four-game sweep when they lost 7-0 to the Boston Red Sox, while the Yankees were foiled in their attempt for a three-game sweep of the Seattle Mariners by a 1-0 setback.

The Yankees' offense has struggled since Aaron Judge was sidelined with a fractured rib on June 1. The pitching rotation, however, has kept them in second place in the American League East behind the Tampa Bay Rays.

"I saw a graphic where we were 18-10 going into the day in the last 28, and it's been the playoffs every day, it feels like," Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. "I got people on the street saying, 'Hey, it will turn around,' and I'm like, 'We're going all right.'"

The Yankees rank 28th in runs in the major leagues since the All-Star break and 30th with a .207 batting average. Their ERA since the break is 2.86, second in the majors.

"We're doing a lot of good things," Boone said. "We're obviously wanting to get the offense jump-started, and we're seeing little signs, little crumbs of that, hopefully. But now it's kind of on to Toronto."

The Blue Jays are 27th in the majors in runs since the All-Star break and are tied for 19th with a .234 batting average. Their ERA since the break is 3.59, tied for eighth.

The Yankees are slated to start right-hander Gerrit Cole (6-5, 3.35 ERA) on Friday. He is 9-2 with a 2.75 ERA in 18 career starts against the Blue Jays.

Cole has a 1.45 ERA in winning his past three starts overall.

Right-hander Shane Bieber (3-2, 5.48 ERA) is the expected Toronto starter. He is 2-1 with a 4.11 ERA in five career starts against the Yankees.

Winning three of four games from Boston gave Toronto a boost in the chase for an American League wild-card spot, but a sweep would have been huge.

Toronto is two games out of the league's third and final wild-card position.

"It's frustrating because we had some opportunities (on Thursday)," Blue Jays manager John Schneider said, "Looking at it in totality, we're playing really well right now. You can see that guys are tired, but they're grinding and they're leaving it out there. Today just wasn't our day, but I like the way we're playing. When you're taking three out of four from a division opponent, it's a good thing."

Toronto infielder Ernie Clement said: "That's a great series win against a really good team. We will use that as momentum going into this next one."

Boston left-hander Payton Tolle held the Blue Jays to two hits on Thursday. The week will not get easier against the Yankees, who are projected to follow Cole with Cam Schlittler and Ryan Weathers on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.

"You're going to run into good pitching," Schneider said. "We're going to face three more good ones this weekend. Baseball's different every single day."

Toronto starter Max Scherzer allowed one run in five innings on Thursday. He reached 3,000 innings pitched after completing the first inning, second to Justin Verlander (3,571 1/3) among active pitchers, and the 139th pitcher in major league history to do so.

Toronto reliever Lazaro Estrada allowed two runs in the ninth Thursday after being recalled from Triple-A Buffalo with Brendon Little going on the paternity list.

--Field Level Media