Why Yankees were teasing Sonny Gray during and after Monday’s win

Yankees pitcher Sonny Gray had a couple of interesting plate appearances on Monday, June 18, 2018 (6/18/18) at Nationals Park in Washington, DC, one of which led to teammates laughing at him. Gray improved to 5-4 on the season with the Yankees’ 4-2 win over the Nationals.

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WASHINGTON, D.C. — Yankees right-hander Sonny Gray warned teammates to expect the worst during his at-bats in Monday night’s road interleague game at Nationals Park.

Turned out his plate appearances actually were pretty good.

It was his baserunning and celebration at home plate after Aaron Hicks’ fifth-inning home run that had everyone laughing at him.

“When Hicks hit a homer, I didn’t how fast to run,” Gray said after the Yankees followed Monday’s loss to the Washington Nationals in the completion of a suspended game with a 4-2 win in the makeup of a rainout. “I didn’t know what I was supposed to do. Then I think I messed up the handshake there at the end. There was too much going on for me.”

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This was a rare chance to hit for Gray, who went into the game 1 for 10 at the plate in his career with a July 2015 single at Dodger Stadium off Dodgers reliever Pedro Baez when he played for the Oakland Athletics.

Plus, as Gray pointed out, “It was the first time I scored. That was fun.”

His first time up Monday, Gray was robbed of extra bases in the third inning when he hit a liner that looked headed for the right-field corner until Nats first baseman Mark Reynolds made a nice play.

Told he lost a double there during his post-game interview, Gray smiled and responded, “Triple!”

Gray was trying to bunt a runner into scoring position when he was up again in the fifth after Austin Romine hit a leadoff single. He got a bunt down that probably would have been good enough to advance most Yankees, but the slow-running Romine was thrown out at second and Gray wound up on first base with a fielder’s choice.

Next up was Hicks, who blasted a two-run homer to right that turned a 2-1 Yankees deficit into a 3-2 lead.

That’s when Gray provided some comedy by running the bases so slow that Hicks had to ease up on his home run trot to avoid passing him.

“I almost caught him,” Hicks said. “And he messed up our handshake at home. I came in for the forearm thing and he wanted to do two hands. I said, ‘We’ve got to figure that out, brother!'”

Gray was teased the rest of the night … during the game in the dugout, then after the Yankees win in the clubhouse and dining room.

“He was just enjoying that home run,” Yankees right fielder Aaron Judge said. “He was acting like he hit that home run. That was pretty funny!”

Gray, who allowed two runs in five-plus innings and was the winning pitcher, took all of the good-natured riding in stride.

“I was telling them when I hit, expect the worst,” Gray said. “Then getting on base, I hadn’t been on base since 2015, so it’s been a while.”

Randy Miller may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @RandyJMiller. Find NJ.com on Facebook.