Why Yankees switched to Kyle Higashioka over Jose Trevino for ALDS Game 3

CLEVELAND — Saturday night finally was Yankees right-hander Luis Severino’s turn to pitch again. It’s been 12 days since the right-hander pitched seven no-hit innings in his final regular-season start on Oct. 3 at Texas.

His catcher that night was Kyle Higashioka.

Makes no sense messing with success, right?

Aaron Boone agrees, so Severino and Higashioka again will be a battery for Game 3 of the Yankees’ American League Division Series against the Cleveland Guardians, with All-Star catching Jose Trevino sitting after starting the first two games.

This is a huge swing game with the best-of-five series tied 1-1 after the Guardians prevailed 4-2 in 10 innings on Friday at Yankee Stadium.

“He caught Sevy’s last outing, which was obviously really good,” Boone said of Higashioka. “That didn’t hurt.”

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Either did Higashioka having an outstanding second half offensively. His first half was awful, as he hit just .174 with five homers and 15 RBI in 48 games, 42 as a starter. After the All-Star break, he batted .299 with five homers and 16 RBI in 35 games, 30 of them starts.

“In the second half, offensively he’s just kind of calmed some things down a little bit,” Boone said. “I think he’s thinking less is more in a way, hasn’t been chasing that power. He’s kind of thinking 80 percent and getting a lot of good swings off.

“Since the All-Star break, he’s been a pretty good offensive player for us, and we love his defense.”

Trevino’s framing stats is a major-league-best plus-15, according to Baseball Savant, but Higashioka is tied for 14th with a plus-3. Also, Higashioka has a better caught stealing percentage than Trevino, 38% to 33%.

“Obviously, Trevino has kind of taken hold of the number one spot, but (Higashioka’s) going to play this month, too, in what we hope is a long month.”

Trevino had a good offensive season, batting .248 with 15 homers and 62 RBI in 115 games, but he hit just .154 over his final nine regular-season games and was 0-for-4 with a sacrifice fly in his first two ALDS games.

Trevino will start Sunday night’s Game 4 because Gerrit Cole will be on the mound for the Yankees — they’ve been together for much of the season — but if there’s a Game 5 on Monday night in New York, Higashioka could be in there if Jameson Taillon is on the mound.

“I felt like (Saturday) was the right day to get Higgy in there and hopefully give us a little bit of a spark,” Boone said.

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Randy Miller may be reached at rmiller@njadvancemedia.com.

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