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Report: Yanks threaten to boycott ESPN personnel over schedule change

Adam Hunger / Getty Images Sport / Getty

The New York Yankees won't acquiesce to a schedule change that has them poised to play three games in two different cities within a 24-hour span next month.

In an effort to get Major League Baseball and ESPN to change the start time of their July 8 series finale in Toronto from 8 p.m. back to 1 p.m., the Yankees - who would be forced to fly to Baltimore immediately following Sunday Night Baseball for a makeup doubleheader the next day - are threatening to boycott ESPN personnel for the remainder of the season, sources with knowledge of the team’s thinking told Andrew Marchand of the New York Post.

"(ESPN will) get no cooperation," one source told Newsday's Erik Boland. "No interviews. No features. Nothing. Zero."

A compromise on the start time is currently being discussed between officials from the league, MLBPA, the Yankees, and ESPN, Marchand's sources added.

Yankees manager Aaron Boone wasn't confident the game time would be changed as of Sunday morning.

"Hopefully there is some pressure being applied because that is not good for the product on the field or the safety of our guys, having go from night game, flight and right into a doubleheader," Boone said. "Anybody who would argue with that is not being truthful."

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