Bronx, NY – The New York Yankees expect to be without first baseman Mark Teixeira for the upcoming week and possibly as many as two weeks due to a strained left calf.
Teixeira suffered the injury after fouling off a pitch in the bottom of the fourth inning of Monday's 8-7, 11-inning loss to the Toronto Blue Jays. Teixeira drew a walk, but remained in the game and hobbled around the bases while scoring on Russell Martin's base hit. Martin's hit caromed off the shin of Blue Jays starter Henderson Alvarez, who also left the contest.
"I thought I could run through it," Teixeira said. "I finished the at-bat and drew a walk, but instead of loosening it up as I was running, it tightened up more."
Teixeira was replaced by Eric Chavez, who moved from third base. Teixeira went to a local hospital for an MRI, which showed a Grade 1 strain. He's expected to miss the remainder of this series and the next one as well.
"I knew something wasn't right. It was severe enough that I knew I needed to get out of the game," he said. "It's very frustrating, we've had our share of bad luck, as most teams in baseball have. We have to fight through it. We've had guys step up all year for us."
Teixeira is batting .255 with 23 homers and a team-leading 81 RBI in 119 games this season. He's the first switch-hitter in baseball history to hit at least 20 homers in each of his first 10 major league seasons.
"It hurts," Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. "It's hard to replace middle of the order guys and it's one of the switch hitters we use to break a lot of things up."
The injury comes in a critical time for the Yankees, whose lead in the AL East is down to 3 1/2 games over the Baltimore Orioles, a team they'll host this weekend.
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