M’s Rojas: Yankees’ Schmidt ‘was clearly tipping’
NEW YORK — With a little nod of his neck as he took his lead off second base, Josh Rojas seemed to signal Mariners teammate Dylan Moore that a cutter was coming from Yankees pitcher Clarke Schmidt.
Moore drove the 93.1 mph pitch 386 feet into the left-field seats for a 2-0 lead, helping Seattle to a 6-3 win over New York on Tuesday night.
“Everybody’s always trying to look for something,” Rojas said Wednesday. “We’re out there trying to find anything we can to gain an advantage.”
MLB Network showed a frame-by-frame comparison of Schmidt in the set position with Moore at the plate in the third inning. Rojas could see none of the ball before a sinker, a little of the ball ahead of a sweeper and a significant portion before a cutter.
Moore had fouled off Schmidt’s first full-count pitch, a sweeper, before the right-hander came back with a cutter.
“You can see in the video he was clearly tipping,” Rojas said.
Schmidt, 28, said after the game the Yankees were aware of the tipping and quickly worked to ensure it wouldn’t happen again.
“Obviously tipping is a part of this game and it’s a factor and it’s always in the back of our heads and something that we’re well aware of,” Schmidt said. “They got two runs on it. But I was able to make adjustments after we saw the video and just part of the game. Another factor in it.”
Schmidt said tipping had been an issue with him in the past.
“It’s just something that we’re constantly with all our guys paying attention to and working on,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.
Mariners manager Scott Servais, a big league catcher from 1991 to 2001, said technology has forced teams to become more alert to tipping.
“You didn’t have all the cameras and all the people working in front offices. It was actually a learned skill,” Servais said. “The days that you weren’t playing, you’re just locked in on that pitcher. Where does he comes set? When does his hand go into his glove? Where’s his eyes? Does he bite his lip when he throws his slider? There’s all kinds of stuff that happens, and in our day, you would just sit and stare at the guy until you try to figure it out for yourself.”
Asked who was the best at picking up tips, Servais brought up his own experience.
“Veteran players that didn’t play much — like myself — knew what to look for,” he said. “I always thought catchers had a good sense for it because they all knew that pitchers all did something a little bit different.”
Rojas said figuring out pitch tips “is a pretty common thing.”
“Even if you have something, it’s still pretty hard to get a hit,” he said.
Major League Baseball’s approval in 2022 of the PitchCom device for communication between pitchers and catchers has largely eliminated catchers signaling pitchers — and the ability of runners at second to pick up those signs. That causes runners to focus on the pitchers.
“Now it’s strictly a game of trying to find little things like that that will give you a tell,” Rojas said.
OTTAWA, Ontario — Max Pacioretty scored the tiebreaking goal with less than six minutes remaining, leading the Toronto Maple Leafs to a series-clinching 4-2 victory over the Ottawa Senators on Thursday night in Game 6 of their first-round matchup.
William Nylander had two goals, including an empty-netter in the final seconds, and an assist, and Auston Matthews added a power-play goal in the first period for Toronto. Anthony Stolarz made 20 saves.
Brady Tkachuk and David Perron scored for Ottawa. Thomas Chabot had two assists and Linus Ullmark made 19 saves.
The Maple Leafs advanced to take on the defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers in the second round of the Eastern Conference playoffs. The Panthers beat the Tampa Bay Lightning in five games in their first-round series.
Toronto grabbed a 3-0 series lead, but Ottawa stayed alive with a 4-3 overtime victory in Game 4 and a 4-0 shutout in Game 5.
The Maple Leafs finally put away the Senators in Game 6.
With the game tied at 2, Pacioretty — a heathy scratch to start the series — scored the winner with 5:39 remaining off a pass from Max Domi that beat Ullmark to the glove side. It was Pacioretty’s first goal of the playoffs.
Scott Laughton hit the post before Nylander iced it into the empty net with 18.3 seconds left.
Matthews put Toronto up 1-0 on a power play with 70 seconds left in the first period when he fired a low shot through traffic.
Nylander, on his 29th birthday, made it 2-0 just 43 seconds into the second when he ripped a shot past Ullmark after Pacioretty forced a turnover from Senators defenseman Nick Jensen.
Ottawa got on the board at 7:28 when Tkachuk tipped a shot past Stolarz.
Toronto, which beat Ottawa four times in five playoffs series in the early 2000s, came close to restoring its two-goal lead when John Tavares poked a loose puck off the post before Ullmark denied Matthew Knies and Brandon Carlo off the rush.
Perron scored with 7:20 left in regulation to tie it on a shot from below the goal line that went in off Stolarz’s back to make it 2-2.
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