Maddon makes good on promise

Cubs manager Joe Maddon made good on his promise to give Pedro Strop a “day at the beach” Sunday after the reliever bailed Chicago out of a ninth-inning jam Saturday to preserve a 5-4 win.

Before Sunday’s game against the Cardinals, Strop’s locker was set up with a beach chair, an ice bucket full of beer bottles, a margarita and other beach paraphernalia.

Maddon promised Strop an off day, too.

“I wanted to really make it really emphatic that he was not playing,” Maddon said.

Maddon is a TV pitchman for a Chicago-area liquor store chain and was asked if he mixed the margarita that was in front of Strop’s locker. He didn’t.

“I would have done the bloody mary if I had been given the opportunity,” Maddon said. “I’m more of a Bloody Mary kind of guy, although that’s definitely more of a margarita setting.”

Braves’ Foltynewicz hospitalized

Atlanta Braves right-hander Mike Foltynewicz has been hospitalized because of blood clots in his right arm.

Assistant general manager John Coppolella said Sunday that Foltynewicz was taken to an emergency room on Friday with swelling and redness in his arm. Coppolella said Foltynewicz remained in Piedmont Hospital.

The team said Foltynewicz is being monitored and treated with blood thinners.

“Our first and foremost thoughts are just for his health and just that he is OK,” Coppolella said. He said the team is “trying to evaluate really where to go from here.”

Foltynewicz is 4-6 with a 5.71 ERA in 15 starts and three relief appearances. His last game was on Aug. 25, and he was placed on the 15-day disabled list with ribs inflammation on Sept. 2.

Coppolella said “the only thing that we do know” is that the blood clots are not related to the ribs inflammation.

Atlanta acquired Foltynewicz on Jan. 14 in a trade that sent catcher-outfielder Evan Gattis to the Houston Astros.

Tanaka has strained hamstring

Masahiro Tanaka has a strained right hamstring and won’t make his scheduled start for the New York Yankees this week during a crucial series in Toronto.

The right-hander got hurt running to first base after bunting Friday in an interleague game against the Mets at Citi Field. He pitched another five innings – pretty well, too – but an MRI revealed the strain.

It is a considerable blow to the Yankees, who hope Tanaka will miss only one turn. They juggled their rotation specifically so he could face the Blue Jays, who hold a 2 ½-game lead in the A.L. East over New York.

Struggling right-hander Ivan Nova, recently removed from the rotation, will start in Tanaka’s place Wednesday night.

Tanaka is 12-7 with a 3.38 ERA, including 2-0 with a 0.56 ERA in his last two starts against Toronto.