"I'm not a guy that's going to go turn over a table. I'm not a guy that's going to jump on a table when we win either, and do a dance. That's not who I am. I've found that managers who have that pretty constant personality are the ones that get the most out of their players," Girardi said. "These are the guys that have to get it done for us. These are our guys — that we're committed to, that we believe in, that we've seen do it year after year after year."
In the quiet clubhouse late Monday night, several players attributed the lack of offense at times — and the losing — to bad luck.
"More than anything, we've just got to pull together. We've got to have faith in each other. We know that we're all capable of doing the job. The back of everybody's baseball card looks pretty good," Swisher said. "Obviously the start hasn't been good for a lot of us — it's been good for some of us. But we've just got to keep pushing, man, because this team is a never-give-up type of team. And regardless of where we are right now, we're going to keep fighting, man, I can promise you that."
Cano, Rodriguez and Swisher were among the hitters out early taking extra batting practice or doing early side work Tuesday. Hitting coach Kevin Long said the Yankees' record is "not acceptable," but the team is trying to stay as loose as possible and have some fun.
"It's tough. There's not too many people in a good mood, including myself," he said. "It's not for lack of effort. It's not for not paying attention to what we're doing. It's just one of those stretches where you scratch your head and you throw your arms up."
At 31 years, 222 days, the Yankees easily started the season with the oldest average roster, according to STATS. The Royals — the youngest at 27 years, 155 days, seemed to have a lot more energy.
While acknowledging "the scoreboard definitely speaks for itself," center fielder Curtis Granderson said the Yankees just have to persevere during their slump and remain in position to make a run.
"You know you're going to have some ups and downs," he said. "Right now, as a whole, we're pretty much having a down. And that's probably the most interesting thing, the fact that there's so many guys that just haven't gotten it going yet. But that's baseball. That means the good side is when we do all finally get it going together, we're going to be very tough.
"And there's still a long time for everything to go ahead and get on the same page. So it just takes a couple things here and there, a couple balls to fall, a couple balls to go our way," he said.
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AP Sports Writer Mike Fitzpatrick contributed to this report.
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