Masahiro Tanaka looks sharp, Gio Gonzalez rusty as Yankees fall to Blue Jays

The Yankees spring slate is nearly over, with just a handful of exhibition matchups remaining before the regular season commences. They didn’t suffer any injuries today, which has to be considered a positive given how much of spring training has gone, but they did fall to the Blue Jays by a score of 7-3. Gleyber Torres launched a three-run shot in the first inning to quickly put the Yankees ahead, but their bats went silent the rest of the way versus the Toronto staff.

You can check out the full box score here. On to our three takeaways:

1. Masahiro Tanaka is ready for his Opening Day start. His outing today was brief, but effective, as he tossed a pair of scoreless innings, striking out three and walking none. He tossed just 29 pitches, but he will be set to throw perhaps two or three times that figure on Thursday when he toes the rubber in the Bronx against the Orioles.
2. Aroldis Chapman, however, appears less prepared for Opening Day. The Yankees closer relieved Tanaka and couldn’t find the strike zone, allowing a single and issuing two four-pitch walks to immediately load the bases with no outs. He recovered to record one strikeout before giving way to Chad Green, who did an excellent Houdini impression by escaping the jam with a pair of strikeouts. Chapman’s fastball was sitting low-to-mid 90’s, not at all where he needs to be in order to rekindle his dominant form of past years
3. Also looking shaky was Gio Gonzalez. The veteran lefty made his spring debut with the Yankees and got knocked around, yielding five runs (four earned) in two frames. He allowed two walks, one home run, and didn’t record a strikeout. His velocity seemed fine, popping the mitt around 90 mph, but Gonzalez clearly has some rust to knock off before he’s ready to contribute at the big-league level.

Highlight of the Game

The Yankees’ penultimate spring training game comes tomorrow, as they travel to take on the Twins at 1:05 EST with James Paxton on the mound.