NEW YORK -- All the big home runs in the first week of the postseason should not be a surprise. The long ball is back.There were 5,610 home runs during the regular season, second only behind the Steroids Era high of 5,693 in 2000.And Mark Teixeira thinks he knows why.I think the balls are harder. Definitely. I can just feel it. I can hear it off the bat, the retiring New York Yankees first baseman said.Already in the young playoffs, Torontos Edwin Encarnacion homered to win the AL wild-card game, San Franciscos Conor Gillaspie had a go-ahead, ninth-inning drive in the NL game and the Cubs Javier Baez hit a decisive eighth-inning shot to win an NL Division Series opener.Cubs pitcher Travis Wood became the first reliever to hit a home run in the postseason since 1924. And on Sunday, Dodgers rookie Corey Seager homered in the first inning for the second straight game against Washington.Home runs had dropped from 4,661 in 2013 to 4,186 the following season. The rise began last year, when the total increased to 4,909.And this year nearly set a record.We have tested the baseball. We are absolutely convinced that this issue is not driven by a difference in the baseball, baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred said. My own view is that the spike is related to the way that the game is being played now, the way that we are training hitters from a very young age, and we have not been able to find any external cause that explains the spike in home runs.A record 111 players hit 20 or more home runs this season, up from 64 last year, according to the Elias Sports Bureau. And forget the days of the weak-hitting, slick-gloved middle infielder. Thirty-five of those players started at least 100 games combined at second base, third or shortstop.Players with 30 or more homers nearly doubled, from 20 to 38.Home runs create a buzz at the ballpark -- especially in the dugouts. Clevelands Roberto Perez, Jason Kipnis and Francisco Lindor all homered in a single inning of the Indians AL Division Series opener against Boston.After the first one, it was exciting. After mine, it was even kind of getting nuts in there, Kipnis said. And the third one, our dugout was kind of losing it.A day later, the Blue Jays connected three times in an inning at Texas.Increasingly, hitters take nothing-or-all swings. Strikeouts set a record for the ninth straight year at 38,982, an average of 8.02 per team per game. Whiffs are up 27 percent from the 6.30 average in 2007.Offense has been redefined.Sometimes a guy working the count and getting to 3-0 and hitting a home run at Yankee Stadium like (Matt) Wieters is small ball, to work the count like that and get a hittable pitch, said Baltimore manager Buck Showalter, whose Orioles led the major leagues with 253 long balls.Teixeiras evidence goes beyond homers. The average velocity of balls off bats this increased from 88.5 mph in 2015 to 89.1 mph this year, according to Major League Baseballs Statcast.All of a sudden, did we get that much better? That much stronger? he said.Big league baseballs are manufactured by Rawlings in Costa Rica, and balls must weight 5-5 1/4 ounces, have a circumference of 9 to 9 1/4 inches and a diameter of 2 7/8 to 3 inches. The company and MLB insist nothing has changed this year.Were not seeing anything outside our normal tolerance range and specification level, Rawlings spokeswoman Kathy Stephens said, adding the company conducts its own tests.In a statement, MLB said: We direct UMass-Lowells Baseball Research Center to conduct periodic testing of baseballs throughout the regular season.Among the balls that are randomly tested are a sampling from the supplies of clubs. Balls are tested for weight, circumference, coefficient of restitution and other factors. Measurements are made to ensure compliance with our rules and are also compared to previous results. These reviews have found no differences to the ball that would have resulted in a change to its performance, MLB said.Texas manager Jeff Banister had anticipated a decrease in home runs during the postseason because of better pitching. Didnt turn out the way.Youre facing the No. 1s and No. 2s and 3s, he said, and those guys dont generally give up the long ball a lot.Didnt turn out the way. Toronto went deep six times in the first two games of the AL Division Series, hitting four home runs off Yu Darvish.With San Francisco playing postseason games at Chicagos Wrigley Field, former Cub Jeff Samardzija knows the weather in the Windy City can impact how the ball travels. Pitchers are especially aware of home runs on the North Side.You look at those flags, he said, and you kind of go from there. Oakland Raiders Kolton Miller Jersey . Catch all the action on TSN2 at 11pm et/8pm pt. 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Winchester, who was not penalized for the hit, appeared to make contact with Kellys head early in the first period of Thursdays game in Boston. BOSTON -- The Bruins finished practice Monday with only one goaltender.And that goalie, prospect Malcolm Subban, had just arrived from Providence as the early saga of the Boston goal continued -- and it appeared Subban would be in goal for Tuesday nights home game against the Minnesota Wild.This all started when starter Tuukka Rask missed the second game of the season, with what was called general soreness. He then played in both the final game of the three-game, season-opening road trip and the home opener -- defeating both the Winnipeg Jets and New Jersey Devils.But Rask said he wasnt at one hundred percent, and Anthon Khudobin played in the 4-2 loss to the Montreal Canadiens last Saturday, with Zane McIntyre on the bench as the recalled backup.McIntyre was sent back and Subban -- 0-3-1 with a 4.50 goals against average at Providence, yielding three goals on nine shots in one -- was brought up to join the team at Mondays practice.Then, Khudobin, expected to start Tuesday, suffered a hand or wrist injury, left the ice. One goal was guarded by a blue screen with holes in it for pucks.Subban, who gave up three goals on six shots in his only NHL game two seasons ago, was the last man standing.If we have to make adjustments and have some new personnel, well deal with it, said coach Claude Julien, who never likes to talk about who his goalie will be in the coming game.He also said, If hes going in goal, hell go in goal, its simple as that.Subban, a first-round draft pick in 2012, is 45-31-15 in 99 career games in the minor leagues.The Bruins, 3-2-0 heading into the finale of a three-game homestand before a four-game road trip (seven of their first 10 games are on the road), will face a Minnesota tam that picked up one of the possible four points in the New York Metropolitan Area over the weekend.The Wild (3-2-1) have allowed at leeast 30 shots on goal in five of their six games and are just making too many mistakes to satisfy new coach Bruce Boudreau.dddddddddddd. They gave up six goals, one into an empty net, in Sunday nights loss to the Islanders in Brooklyn.If you dont practice the same thing over and over early, you sometimes forget, and you start playing the game like shinny, Boudreau said after practice Monday. We had to go over some points that I think were starting to get away from us and bring everything back into focus.The Bruins swept the two-game series from the Wild each of the last two seasons. But Bostons home-ice troubles, which cost the Bruins a playoff spot last year, is again threatening to be a problem. The Bruins escaped with a 2-1 victory over New Jersey -- Patrice Bergeron scoring the winner with 1:15 left -- and then fell to the rival Canadiens.Juliens team, which has missed the playoffs the last two seasons, has allowed the first goal in all five games.I hope its not a habit, the coach said Saturday. Its certainly not what were looking for. But theres no doubt, I think its pretty obvious that with the amount of games weve played, five games, we havent scored first. We talked about that (Saturday) morning, trying to get that first goal, and it hasnt happened yet.Darcy Kuemper was shaky in the Minnesota goal Sunday, in a game that saw Zach Parise score his 300th and 301st NHL goals.On Kuempers early woes of giving up multiple goals in bunches, Boudreau, whose top goalie is Devan Dubnyk, said, It has to stop. Were not putting Kuemps in -- not to throw him under the bus, but I mean we plan on playing him a few more games than weve played him in the past, so sometimes we need that superb goaltending job. Wholesale NFL Womens Jerseys China Womens NFL Jerseys Nike NFL Jerseys China Cheap NFL Jerseys Outlet Cheap NFL Jerseys Wholesale Wholesale NFL White Jerseys Discount Jerseys ' ' '