NEW YORK — Toronto Blue Jays manager John Gibbons was ejected from a game for the fifth time this season during Saturday’s 6-0 win over the New York Yankees, and you won’t believe the magic words that prompted home-plate umpire Greg Gibson to toss him this time.

“All I said to him was, ‘Hey, can I talk to you a minute?’” Gibbons recalled. “He might have misinterpreted that and threw me out.”

Wait, what? That’s all it took?

“Yeah, I’m not always the clearest guy to understand,” he said, “but that’s what I did say.”

Gibbons’ ejection came in the middle of the third inning, after Gibson called Josh Donaldson out on a check swing to end the top half of the frame. It was the second straight disputed check swing that went against Donaldson, and the all-star third baseman was visibly angry.

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“Even before that last one Josh was in the box and the pitcher’s about to deliver and he’s looking back at [the umpire], so it was getting a little testy,” explained Gibbons. “I was just walking out there because I wanted to discuss something with him. …

“Really all I was going to do was just try to temper some things down a little bit and say, ‘Hey, you know what, he’s a very intense guy.’ And Gibson’s one of your more intense umpires, too.”

Bad idea, as it turned out.

Once he was ejected, Gibbons pleaded his case to Gibson, asking him to ask the first or third base umpires on check swings, rather than making the call himself.

As the manager said he told the umpire, “this isn’t about me, it’s not about you. Get some help because I don’t think he went on that second one. That’s a tough call. I get it. But there were some calls later in the game that they were appealing.

“I thought [the ejection] was rinky-dink myself but you always have that fallback plan with you can’t argue balls and strikes. But it wasn’t balls and strikes, it was a checked swing.”