NEW YORK (AP) — Baggy pants are in style for the Yankees' Jazz Age.
When Jazz Chisholm Jr. leaned in the batter's box as he tried to will his drive fair, the material in his baggy, pinstriped pants sagged. In an effort of break out of his early season slump, the New York Yankees second baseman has been wearing Giancarlo Stanton's uniform trousers and using José Caballero's bat.
Oxford Bags, as extra-wide pants were known in 1920s Britain, could become
a trend if Chisholm keeps hitting.
“My teammates love 'em,” Chisholm said after his tiebreaking, two-run homer in the seventh inning led the Yankees to a 7-6 win over Toronto on Monday night. “I hear a lot of fans on the road talk about it but at home guys like it.”
An All-Star last season when he had 31 homers, 80 RBIs and 31 stolen bases, Chisholm didn't hit his first home run this year until April 23. His batting average sunk to .200 during last week's trip to Baltimore.
Listed at 5-foot-11 and 184 pounds, the 28-year-old Chisholm had been borrowing the looser pants of 221-pound teammate Trent Grisham. He couldn't find a Grisham pair last Wednesday at Baltimore.
“I went to Big G's pants, and the balls were coming off hot,” Chisholm said.
Wearing the baggier breeches of the 6-foot-6, 245-pound Stanton, Chisholm had a double that day. Then he went 7 for 12 wearing Stanton's knickers during a Subway Series against the New York Mets at Citi Field last weekend.
“Jazz has so much swag. He can really kind of pull off anything,” teammate Cody Bellinger said.
Chisholm also switched in Baltimore from his regular bat, manufactured by Chandler, to a 34-inch, 31-ounce Victus model used by Caballero.
“I was like, bro, keep my bat hot, and he’s like, `All right, let me try that,'” said Caballero, on the injured list with a broken finger. “His is more end-loaded. Mine is more balanced so you can really feel your hands.”
Baseball players, a superstitious lot, will go to long lengths to change their luck. Bellinger recalled how he busted out of a lengthy slump at Double-A Tulsa in 2016.
“Showered with my jersey on,” he said. “It did work. I ended up having a really good year.”
New York trailed 5-3 in the seventh when Aaron Judge singled with two outs off Yariel Rodríguez, who had just relieved. Bellinger drove a low splitter off the top of the right-center wall and into the Yankees bullpen for a two-run homer that tied the score.
Grisham pinch hit and walked, and Chisholm sliced a slider down the left-field line. He watched and leaned as the ball clanked off the foul pole.
“I was trying to steer it with my mind,” he said.
Chisholm flipped his bat, turned to teammates in the dugout and pounded his chest, then made a basketball jump shot motion as he rounded the bases. He raised his batting average to .237.
“He was missing pitches that he usually hits,” manager Aaron Boone said, “and now you're seeing it come to its level a little bit.”
Boone accepts the sartorial strangeness.
“I think he looks great, especially when his uni's dirty and he's running around the bases,” the manager said. “So, whatever he's got to do.”
Given the 7-5 lead, David Bednar hung on in the ninth after allowing pinch-hitter Jesús Sánchez's RBI double. Toronto had two on and one out when Bednar struck out George Springer, then retired Vladimir Guerrero Jr. on a grounder to Chisholm.
Chisholm doesn't have to look for Stanton's pants anymore. Equipment manager Rob Cucuzza is leaving him the capacious Stanton trousers.
“They have my name on them now,” Chisholm said.
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