Around the Empire: Yankees news - 4/10/17

New York Daily News | Mike Mazzeo: Gary Sanchez is hurt and the world is awful. Fortunately though, Joe Girardi said that the Yankees’ catcher is feeling better, but they still don’t know an exact timetable for his return. In the interim, Austin Romine and Kyle Higashioka will likely share duties instead of either getting a bulk of the starts. Romine has the big league experience, but Girardi suggested Higashioka could team up with pitchers he has previously caught in the minors. So probably starts from Severino and the team’s fifth starter who is quite literally a player to be named later.

New York Post | Kevin Kernan: When the Yankees brought Matt Holliday in on a one-year deal one of the added bonuses to his offensive abilities was his veteran leadership. Well it seems that veteran leadership is already paying off because Holliday has apparently formed a bond with Aaron Judge and taken him under his wing (related: I can’t wait until Greg Bird is a veteran and mentors some young player). Judge says he’s been asking Holliday about his career and he leans on Holliday for advice. Not a bad role model for Judge.

New York Daily News | Mike Mazzeo: Aaron Judge doing Aaron Judge things is one of the reasons the Yankees were able to come away with a victory in yesterday’s game. After ripping an extremely hard hit single in the sixth that almost cleared the wall in left field, Judge hit the game-tying homer there two innings later. Then in the ninth, he made a diving catch for the game’s final out. Judge had a great spring but, like the Yankees, stumbled out of the gate in the regular season. He says he’s needs to be more aggressive and that he’s getting more and more comfortable playing in major league games.

NJ.com | Randy Miller: After having a great spring training, the Yankees came out of the gate stumbling in the first week of the regular season. So naturally, everyone was sent into panic mode, even Brett Gardner. When his father texted him good luck before yesterday’s win, Gardner replied back half-joking that it was a “must-win game on April 9.” After losing two of three to the Rays, dropping the first two games to the Orioles, and losing Sanchez in the same week, it was good for the Yankees to end the week on a high note. Luckily the season is still young, they may have stumbled but it’s not lost just yet.