Roki Sasaki looks like different animal in narrative-changing gem at Yankee Stadium

NEW YORK — Dave Roberts didn’t indulge the narrative.But the clock was ticking on Roki Sasaki nonetheless.This weekend, Blake Snell will begin a rehab assignment for the Dodgers.That means, within a month, the team will have to boot someone from its rotation to make room for his return.Going into the All-Star break, the natural answer appeared to be Sasaki, who finished the first half of the season with a rotation-worst 5.33 ERA.So, Roberts was asked Friday, how important would these next couple weeks be for Sasaki, as Snell gets close to making his return?“Well, Snell is starting a rehab assignment, but I wouldn’t say he’s getting close,” Roberts said.“Nice try,” the veteran manager then added with a sly grin.Alas, it turned out no public pressure was needed for the 24-year-old phenom to finally turn a corner.In the Dodgers’ 2-1 win over the Yankees on Friday night, Sasaki delivered his most promising outing as a member of the Dodgers’ rotation.With his fastball playing up at a career-best 100.1 mph average, and his splitter coming out so deceptively that catcher Dalton Rushing joked, “I had trouble catching [it] for half the game, so that’s a pretty good sign,” Sasaki blew the Yankees’ lineup away in a 5 ⅔-inning gem that included only one unearned run.“Very impressive,” Roberts said afterward.

“Gosh, I mean, the velocity, he dialed it up.”“That,” Rushing added, “was about as quality as we’ve seen him this year.”Indeed, while Roberts might not have said so pregame, Sasaki desperately needed this.A night in which he threw more 100 mph fastballs (21) than he had in the entirety of his career as an MLB starter previously (14). A night in which he went on the attack, put an opposing lineup on their heels and coupled his triple-digit velo (his 21 pitches of 100+ mph were also the most by any Dodgers pitcher since the league began tracking pitch speeds in 2008) with an assortment of swing-and-miss breaking stuff.A night ...