TORONTO — Joe Kelly’s appeal of a six-game suspension was denied by John McHale Jr., a special assistant to baseball commissioner Rob Manfred, and the Boston pitcher started serving the penalty on Thursday night against Toronto.
Kelly was disciplined for twice throwing at the New York Yankees’ Tyler Austin on April 11. Austin charged the mound and was suspended five games, but MLB reduced his penalty to four games, according to a yankees.com report.
Kelly has a 3.09 ERA in 11 games this season. After allowing four runs in one-third of an inning in an opening-day loss to Tampa Bay, Kelly has not allowed a run in 11 1/3 innings. Boston will have to play with 24 active players during the suspension.
Austin will start serving his suspension when the Yankees play the Angels in Anaheim in Friday.
“The timing’s not perfect, obviously,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said in the website report on Thursday before the decision was announced. “He’s been a really important player to us. We’re getting ready to go to Anaheim, where we’re going to face two lefties, and we really like him against lefties. But that is the situation we’re in.”
“I don’t want to get into whether I agree with [the decision] or not, but I’m happy they knocked one game down,” Austin said. “I’m thankful for that.”