Yankees come up blank again

TORONTO -- Freddy Garcia was supposed to give the Yankees what Bartolo Colon could not: distance and a "W." But instead, the righthander faced a similar fate in Toronto.

A night after scoring eight runs in two-thirds of an inning against Colon, the Blue Jays tagged Garcia for seven hits and six runs Friday night en route to a 7-1 victory.

The Yankees (53-37) stalled their own cause with two errors, including one by Russell Martin that aided a three-run fifth inning for the Blue Jays (47-47).

It was the second straight loss and fourth out of six for the Yankees, who opened the series with a 16-7 loss Thursday.

Friday night was a chance for the Yankees to bounce back, to turn the page on Thursday's embarrassing performance. But to the dismay of Joe Girardi, the same issues -- poor pitching and even worse defense -- cropped up again.

"It's frustrating when we're not playing fundamental baseball," Martin said of the team's five errors in two games. "But it's not something that we can't turn around."

Girardi said he hasn't lost confidence in either Colon or Garcia.

"It's not the way you want to start out, but let's not make too much of them," he said. "It's two games. We'll get back on track and we'll start playing well again . . . If every time your starter went out and had not such a good start and you lost confidence in them, you'd run out of starters in a hurry."

The plan was for Garcia (7-7, 3.43) to give them consistency and command, but he looked out of sync compared with Blue Jays starter Brandon Morrow (6-4), who allowed one run and four hits in 62/3 innings.

Garcia, who was lifted after five innings, said the use of multiple signs, even without runners on base, threw off his rhythm.

"We changed the signs all the time, so it's hard sometimes to get into a rhythm," said Garcia, who uncharacteristically left several breaking balls up in the zone. "When you can't find the rhythm, they know."

Martin said the constant sign changing was Girardi's idea, in response to the Jays relaying signs from second base Thursday night, and it was the first time he and Garcia had done so when no runners were on.

"You don't want them knowing what's going on, but at the same time, you still got to execute pitches and keep the game simple," said Martin, who added that he didn't notice the Blue Jays trying to steal signs Friday.

Even without Jose Bautista, out with an ankle injury, the Blue Jays jumped all over Garcia, hitting five doubles off him. A one-out double by Eric Thames and a single by Yunel Escobar resulted in a 1-0 first-inning lead. The Jays tacked on two runs in the fourth and three in the fifth.

After Garcia walked Escobar and Adam Lind to load the bases with no outs, Aaron Hill grounded into a forceout, which allowed a run to score. Escobar then scored on a sacrifice fly by Travis Snider and Hill stole second. After Garcia intentionally walked Edwin Encarnacion, Hill and Encarnacion took off on a double-steal during Corey Patterson's at-bat. Martin tried to throw out Hill at third, but his throw to Eduardo Nuñez was off line. That allowed Hill to score and give the Jays a five-run lead.

The Blue Jays had 11 hits, bringing their two-game total to 31. The Yankees, who had seven hits, scored their lone run in the second on a Nuñez single.