An interesting sideshow to tonight's Yankees-Tigers game will be the interplay between Yankees manager Joe Girardi and home plate umpire Bob Davidson.

The last time Davidson worked the plate for a Yankees game, it was right here on June 3, and both Girardi and hitting coach Kevin Long got tossed in the seventh inning after arguing a strike call to Curtis Granderson. Davidson ejected Long first, and Girardi followed shortly thereafter when he argued on behalf of his coach.

The dispute stemmed from a called strike on the first pitch to Granderson, who wound up popping out with two runners on in a game the Yankees lost 4-3.

"Bob Davidson chose to look right at K-Long, as opposed to turning over his right and going back to home plate," Girardi said at the time. "Now, this is a game of emotion and you've got one of the most prolific home run hitters in the game right now -- second and third, one out -- and you get a call like that, we're going to be upset."

And Monday night, Girardi nearly got ejected in the third inning for arguing balls and strikes with home plate ump Tony Randazzo and had to be pulled away by his bench coach, Tony Pena.

But before tonight's game, Girardi said he did not think either the incident in May or the one last night would carry over into tonight's game.

"People are probably making a bigger deal out of this than I am," he said. "How many times have I been thrown out? Forty? (Actually, 19 --16 as a manager and three as a player.) And I’ve never gone back to an umpire. I don’t really think much of it. The first couple times I probably thought a lot of it. Now, I don’t want to say I’m Bobby Cox (baseball's all-time leader with 161 ejections), but I’ve been thrown out enough to know you just put it behind you. And I think they do too."

We'll see what happens tonight.