TAMPA — As the ball climbed into the sky of white clouds, the only question was if the wind blowing that way would make it interfere with the traffic on Dale Mabry Highway well beyond George M. Steinbrenner Field’s center-field fence.
In the end, Gary Sanchez’s towering homer never made the street, but it did clear the center-field clock used for displaying how much time between innings a pitcher has to throw his first pitch.
Nothing counts under the palm trees, but Sanchez’s performances at the plate and behind it are impossible to ignore. He has quickly morphed into a “Can’t Miss At-Bat’’ the way Darryl Strawberry, Alex Rodriguez and Reggie Jackson once were.