Yankee News For Yankee Fans

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New York Yankees' Jacoby Ellsbury hits a seventh-inning triple in a baseball game against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium in New York, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2014.

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New York Yankees' Brett Gardner, right, hits a seventh-inning RBI-single in a baseball game against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium in New York, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2014. The Yankees defeated the Red Sox 5-1.

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New York Yankees' Brian McCann hits a seventh-inning RBI-single in a baseball game against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium in New York, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2014.

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New York Yankees reliever David Robertson follows through on a ninth-inning pitch in a 5-1 victory over the Boston Red Sox in a baseball game at Yankee Stadium in New York, Wednesday, Sept. 3, 2014.

[sabugo]

I agree with every word of that last article.

x2. That's the price you pay for 'history'.

[Yankee4Life]

Mark Teixeira, Chase Headley both homer in ninth to lift Yankees over Red Sox

The win meant the Yankees would lose no ground in the race for the second AL wild card spot.

Chase Headley plays the hero and possibly saves the Yankees' season with his walk-off solo home run in the bottom of the ninth.

Chase Headley’s Yankee career started with a walk-off hit. Turns out it was only his second-biggest hit in pinstripes.

Headley launched a walk-off homer against Koji Uehara Thursday night, lifting the Yankees to a dramatic 5-4 win over the rival Red Sox that may have saved their season.

“It’s very important,” Headley said. “Every game for us is big. Just another win — one more toward where we want to go.”

Headley’s heroics were made possible by Mark Teixeira, who drilled a game-tying home run to right off the All-Star closer to open the ninth.

“That’s huge,” Headley said. “That really takes the pressure off everybody. I’m up there and I’m playing with house money.”

Mark Teixeira celebrates with Brian McCann after his home run ties the game in the ninth.

The Yankees were three outs away from their third consecutive series loss, and this time they were on their home turf against the lowly Red Sox.

Boston carried a one-run lead into the ninth thanks to three home runs, two by David Ortiz and one by Brock Holt, whose fifth-inning shot off Chris Capuano looked like it would account for the game-winner.

But Teixeira drilled a 2-2 pitch into the right-field seats, then after Brian McCann flied out to left, Headley worked the count to 3-2 and was expecting a fastball. Uehara tried something different.

“I got a split and was able to put a good swing on it,” Headley said.

Teixeira was just settling back into the dugout when Headley hit his game-winner to right.

“It erupted,” Teixeira said. “It’s been an up-and-down season for all of us. When you can win a game like that, win a series in that fashion, it just doesn’t happen very much. That was a fun dugout.”

Adam Warren worked out of a jam he created in the ninth after hitting a batter and committing an error, keeping the deficit at one. Warren (3-5) combined with Rich Hill, Esmil Rogers, Josh Outman and Shawn Kelley to throw 42⁄3 innings of one-hit, scoreless ball.

“They were the MVPs of the game,” Capuano said.

Derek Jeter shows he has some fight left in him in his final month, lacing a two-run double in the third inning.

The win left the Yankees four games behind the Tigers in the race for the second AL wild-card spot with 24 games remaining.

“It’s a great win,” Joe Girardi said. “We needed it — and we’re going to need a lot more. But it’s a great win.”

Ortiz’s two homers gave the Red Sox an early 3-0 lead, but the Yankees answered with three runs in the third inning to tie the game. Two of those came on a huge double to center by Derek Jeter, who had only one extra-base hit in his previous 77 at-bats.

“I’ve talked about this guy; he’s been big in the months of September and October,” Girardi said. “He understands what it’s all about.”

Holt’s homer to right in the fifth put the Red Sox back on top, and while the five Yankees relievers did an exceptional job against Boston, the Yankee hitters looked mostly feeble against Brandon Workman, who allowed only the three third-inning runs over his six frames.

When September call-up Antoan Richardson got doubled off first on a fly ball to center in the seventh, it looked like it would be another brutal, costly loss for the Yankees.

But Uehara — who had two blown saves, two losses and an 18.90 ERA in his past four outings — couldn’t slam the door.

Teixeira admitted he was trying to take the closer deep when he stepped to the plate, but after getting to a two-strike count, he changed his approach and was looking to hit the ball to left field against the shift.

“He hung a split in the middle of the plate, and because of that, I stayed on it and put a good swing on it,” Teixeira said.

Headley came to bat one out later trying to be aggressive. Uehara hung another splitter, allowing Headley to put the biggest swing of his Yankees career on it. How did it compare to his 14th-inning game-winner back on July 22?

“A little bit different — I actually knew everybody’s name this time,” Headley said with a grin. “Every one’s fun. There’s not a whole lot better feelings in sports and in baseball then getting a walk-off hit. Obviously the circumstances that we’re in right now, we’ve got to win every game that we play. That’s our mentality.”

[Yankee4Life]

Chase Headley bashes winner, but Mark Teixeira's bat could spark Yankees as they chase playoffs

It has been a forgettable season for Teixeira, nagged by injuries to the point where you start to wonder just how much of a decline he’s in at age 34. But a hot month could make all the difference.

Mark Teixeira (c.) waits for Chase Headley after the third baseman's game-winning homer, but it could be Tex - who ties the game with a homer in 9th - that gets hot enough to lead Yankees to playoffs.

Down a run in the ninth inning, Mark Teixeira admitted that he was trying to be the hero the Yankees desperately needed — until Koji Uehara got two strikes on him.

Then, out of respect for Uehara’s off-speed splitter, Teixeira decided he couldn’t afford to be so bold.

“It’s funny how baseball works,” Teixeira said afterward. “I was trying to hit a home run until I got two strikes, and then, his split is so good that if you try to pull it, chances are if he throws a good one you’re going to miss it or roll (it) over for a ground ball.

“So at that point I’m up there trying to hit a line drive to left field.”

Of such decisions are momentous victories born. Or is that making too much of this?

Perhaps, considering the predicament the Yankees have put themselves in, but for a few moments on Thursday night it felt like old times at the Stadium, as Teixeira and Chase Headley hit ninth-inning home runs to stun the Red Sox, 5-4, and breathe life into this stop-and-go chase of a wild-card berth.

“Two home runs in the ninth, that used to happen a lot more around here,” Teixeira said at his locker. “We know home runs have been down. But we’re going to keep fighting. This is a huge win.

“You feel like you kind of stole one.”

It helped that Uehara, practically unhittable last season for the Red Sox, has been awful lately. Still, who saw this coming?

The Yankees were on their way to another dreary defeat, with five hits over eight innings — another night for everyone to ask why this team can’t hit.

And Teixeira — of all people — he has been in a miserable slump, his average down to .223 as the night began — hitting under. 200 with only two home runs in August and September.

Indeed, it has been a forgettable season for Teixeira, nagged by injuries to the point where you start to wonder just how much of a decline he’s in at age 34.

“It’s been a struggle for me all year," he admitted. “But if I have a strong September and we make the playoffs, it would kind of wipe the slate clean. That’s what I’m hoping for.”

Teixeira watches his solo blast leave the yard on Thursday night.

It is still a longshot at this point for the Yankees. They remain four games behind in the race for the second wild-card berth, seemingly incapable of running off the type of sustained hot streak it would take to overcome both the Tigers and the Mariners.

But when they get big home runs on back-to-back nights from Brian McCann, another underachieving hitter, and now Teixeira and Chase Headley, well, that offers at least some reason to believe.

In Teixeira’s case, especially, a hot month could make all the difference. He has 21 home runs in a bad season and is capable of carrying a ballclub for a few weeks with his power.

He doesn’t mind telling you he can do it, either, which is why he was thinking about going deep when he led off the bottom of the ninth.

He wouldn’t give away his approach to Uehara, but it sounded like he went up there looking for a fastball early in the count, knowing the Sox closer likes to get ahead in the count and then go to his splitter.

“When you’re a power hitter you’ve gotta take chances,” was the way Teixeira put it. “You’ve gotta get the head (of the bat) out, you’ve gotta try to pull the ball sometimes.”

Teixeira mobs Headley (l.) after the win.

Uehara did throw three fastballs to open the at-bat, but nothing that Teixeira could pull into the right field seats. With the count 2-and-1, he fooled Teixeira with a splitter, getting a swing and miss, and at that point, the Yankees’ first baseman decided the pull in the reins and hope to poke an opposite-field single, especially since the Sox shift opened that side of the infield.

Uehara threw another splitter, down, that Teixieira managed to foul off, and then one more time he went with the off-speed pitch, only this one hung about thigh-high in the middle of the plate.

And that’s how a left field approach turned into a home run to right.

“Because I wasn’t trying to pull it,” Teixeira said, “I was able to stay on it and put a good swing on it.

“It just happened that my approach worked. He could have thrown me an inside fastball and jammed me and I pop it up. Instead he hung a splitter.”

Maybe it will be remembered in a few weeks as the home run that launched a miracle run to October. It’s not likely, but on a night when, out of nowhere, it felt like old times at the Stadium, Teixeira and the Yankees had a right to believe anything is still possible.

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Ichiro Suzuki of the New York Yankees catches a fly ball hit by Xander Bogaerts of the Boston Red Sox and makes a throw during the second inning in a MLB baseball game at Yankee Stadium on September 4, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.

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New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter throws to first to put out Boston Red Sox's Mookie Betts for the third out in the seventh inning of a baseball game at Yankee Stadium in New York, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2014.

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New York Yankees' Mark Teixeira watches his game-tying solo home run off Boston Red Sox relief pitcher Koji Uehara in the ninth inning of the Yankees' 5-4 victory over the Red Sox in a baseball game at Yankee Stadium in New York, Thursday, Sept. 4, 2014.

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Chase Headley of the New York Yankees celebrates after hitting a walk off home run in the ninth inning to defeat of the Boston Red Sox 5-4 during a MLB baseball game at Yankee Stadium on September 4, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.

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Michael Pineda of the New York Yankees delivers a pitch against the Kansas City Royals during the first inning of a MLB baseball game at Yankee Stadium on September 5, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.

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New York Yankees starting pitcher Michael Pineda throws to the Kansas City Royals during the first inning of a baseball game, Friday, Sept. 5, 2014, in New York.

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You deserved better Pineda.

[sabugo]

You deserved better Pineda.

So did we.

[Yankee4Life]

Brandon McCarthy has solid outing, Martin Prado and Jacoby Ellsbury lead Yankees' lineup in 6-2 win over Royals

The Yankees started the day 4½ games back and tied with the Indians in the race for the second American League wild-card berth. Both teams trailed Seattle, the leader for the second spot, and Detroit.

Jacoby Ellsbury hits an RBI triple and scores a run in the Yankees' 6-2 win over the Royals.

Martin Prado was trying to be as cautious as he could be while still doing his job as a Major League Baseball player. Trouble was, he could hardly nurse his aching left hamstring on Saturday when he kept lashing line drives and running the bases.

Luckily for the Yankees, Prado was feeling good after playing for the first time in three days, because they’ll need more of the same from him if they want to have any hope of wild-card contention. Prado was a pinstriped spark plug once again, ripping three hits and scoring twice in the Yanks’ 6-2 victory over the Royals in front of 45,262 at the Stadium.

The win gave the Yankees perhaps the perfect springboard into Sunday’s Derek Jeter Day and also helped shake off the sting of a difficult 1-0 loss Friday night.

“Hitters like that, the biggest compliment you can give is that they’re just a pain in the ass,” said Brandon McCarthy, the winning pitcher who allowed two runs in 6.2 innings. “Go back to Jeter’s prime, that’s exactly (what Prado is doing). He’s not knocking balls 20 rows deep. He’s not just driving the ball all over. But they’re just always on pitches.

“They’re hard to get out. It’s just line drive after line drive after line drive, and the weeks that those start to fall, it’s easy for a lineup to just kind of carry on his momentum.”

The Yankees started the day 4½ games back and tied with the Indians in the race for the second American League wild-card berth. Both teams trailed Seattle, the leader for the second spot, and Detroit.

Prado, who is hitting .403 since Aug. 16, had missed the previous three games because of the hamstring strain, and the Yanks would’ve missed him even more Saturday because Brett Gardner did not play because of an abdominal injury that might keep him out Sunday, too.

Martin Prado scores a run as he returns after missing the last three games with three hits.

“It’s been killing me just to see everybody grind it out up there every single day and knowing that we got a pretty good chance to do something special here, so I put myself in a spot where I’m just going up there,” Prado said. “I’m a guy to always go 100% but in this case I got to just play a little bit smart.”

The Yankees probably caught a break in the first inning when Danny Duffy was hurt on his first and only pitch. Immediately after the K.C. lefty threw a ball to Jacoby Ellsbury, Royals personnel came out to the mound and, moments later, Duffy was heading toward the dugout.

The official diagnosis, at least initially, was “left shoulder soreness,” the Royals said. For the Yankees, it meant they did not have to face a difficult pitcher with a 2.42 ERA.

Brandon McCarthy tosses 6 2/3 innings, allowing just two earned runs as he continues to impress during his second half stint with the Yankees.

“It wasn’t something that I thought about, but it was an opportunity there,” McCarthy said. “You’re getting rid of one of the better pitchers in baseball. You’ve got a long trek through the pen that hopefully we can jump on, get some runs and turn this into a win.”

Reliever Liam Hendriks got the first two outs of the first inning, but Prado doubled to center and scored on Mark Teixeira’s single to center. Prado said he rounded the bases saying, “Please let me get to home plate and then I’ll figure out if I’m good or not.”

He was.

On the eve of Derek Jeter Day, the captain knocks in a run with a sac fly.

The Royals tied the score in the third inning on Alex Gordon’s RBI single to center, but ran themselves out of the inning on the same play. Ellsbury, who does not have the game’s greatest throwing arm, tumbled to try to snare Gordon’s hit but missed. Ellsbury popped up and spied Omar Infante trying to go from first to third and threw him out, ending the threat.

From there, the Yankees took the lead for good, scoring twice in the third. John Ryan Murphy, getting a spot start behind plate, led off with a double to left center and Ellsbury tripled him home. Then Jeter hit a sac fly to center. In the fourth, Chase Headley scored from third on an errant pickoff attempt by Royals catcher Salvador Perez.

Carlos Beltran hit an RBI double to right center that plated Prado in the fifth and pinch-hitter Ichiro Suzuki added an RBI single to center.

Then it was up to McCarthy (6-4) and the bullpen. McCarthy, who allowed six hits, walked one and struck out four, got a nice hand when he came off the mound after giving up a sac fly in the seventh. Shawn Kelley, Dellin Betances and David Robertson provided 2.1 innings of scoreless relief.

But Prado, as he has much of the time since the July 31 trade that brought him from Arizona, provided the initial spark.

“You get someone coming in and doing what he did, it picks your club up,” Joe Girardi said. “It’s uplifting.”

[Yankee4Life]

New York Yankees starting pitcher Brandon McCarthy throws during the second inning of the baseball game against the Kansas City Royals at Yankee Stadium, Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014 in New York.

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New York Yankees' Jacoby Ellsbury hits a triple during the third inning of the baseball game against the Kansas City Royals at Yankee Stadium, Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014 in New York.

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Ichiro Suzuki of the New York Yankees beats the ball to first base for a single before Eric Hosmer of the Kansas City Royals can catch it during the seventh inning of the baseball game against the Kansas City Royals at Yankee Stadium, Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014 in New York. The Yankees defeated the Royals 6-2.

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New York Yankees center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury makes a sliding catch during the eighth inning of the baseball game against the Kansas City Royals at Yankee Stadium, Saturday, Sept. 6, 2014 in New York. The Yankees defeated the Royals 6-2.

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Yankees overcome early deficit, Brian McCann, Chris Young and bullpen spark 8-5 win over Rays

The Bombers had not rallied from a four-run hole once this season, all 34 of their come-from-behind wins taking place in games they trailed by three-or-fewer runs.

Brian McCann stands at home plate and watches his home run to see if it stays fair in the Yankees' 8-5 comeback win over Tampa Bay.

Will the Yankees’ biggest comeback victory of the season be the one that sparks an epic September comeback?

That’s what the Bombers are hoping after their 8-5 win over the Rays Wednesday night at the Stadium, one that saw the Yankees overcome a deficit of four or more runs for the first time all year.

“Just to see our team come back, we could have easily have just crawled in a hole and lost the game, not really thought anything about it,” said Adam Warren, one of five relievers to combine for 8.2 innings of one-run ball.

“We fought back. I was really impressed with our team.”

Brian McCann homered and drove in the first three runs of the night for the Yankees, while ex-Met Chris Young’s solo shot tied the game in the fourth to make up for Chris Capuano’s brief-but-disastrous start that lasted one-third of an inning.

Mark Teixeira and Chase Headley — the heroes from last week’s ninth-inning comeback against the Red Sox — each drove in a run in the fifth to give the Yankees a lead the bullpen would not relinquish.

The relief corps combined to throw 8.1 scoreless innings before Evan Longoria homered off Esmil Rogers with two out in the ninth, halting the unit’s scoreless streak at 29 innings.

“It was amazing. We have a resilient group of guys out there, and I think the main thing is for the pitching staff to be able to come up and throw seven zeroes on the board for us, just to give us the opportunity to get ourselves back in the game,” Young said. “It was huge for us. We battled our way, one run here, one run there, and next thing you know we’re back in the game.”

Detroit’s loss to Kansas City left the Yankees 4.5 games behind the Tigers for the second AL wild-card spot.

The win lifted the Yanks to 4-4 through the first eight games of this crucial nine-game home stand. A victory in Thursday night’s rubber match would give the Yankees another series and send them on the road with some momentum.

There was no momentum in the home dugout after Capuano stunk it up in the first inning, allowing four hits and two walks against the Rays’ first seven batters as Tampa Bay jumped out to a 3-0 lead.

With a razor-thin margin for error the rest of the way, Girardi wasted no time in giving his starter the hook, lifting Capuano with one out and the bases loaded.

“It’s definitely frustrating and you wish you could have it back,” Capuano said. “It’s one of those ones that’s tough to deal with, but you have to put it behind you.”

Chris Young gets a high-five after his big fly.

Chase Whitley limited the damage by allowing only one of the runners to score. For most teams, 4-0 would hardly be an insurmountable deficit. For the 2014 Yankees, it had proven to be exactly that through the first 142 games.

The Bombers had not rallied from a four-run hole once this season, with all 34 of their come-from-behind victories taking place in games they trailed by three or fewer runs. McCann hit a solo shot to right off Jake Odorizzi (10-12) in the first, then drove in two more runs with a single to center in the third to make it 4-3. Young tied the game in the fourth with a solo shot to left, his first as a Yankee and ninth of the season overall.

Whitley and Preston Claiborne (3-0) moved the game through the fifth before the Yanks seized the lead on Teixeira’s RBI triple to right. Headley followed with a run-scoring single to center off Jeff Beliveau to make it 6-4.

“Down 4-0, sometimes four runs is all they need to win, but we’ve had that plenty of times,” Teixeira said. “There’s no panic, and we slowly got the job done as the game went on.”

Warren took the bullpen baton and tossed 1.2 scoreless innings, then Dellin Betances recorded the next four outs before the Yanks tacked on two more runs in the eighth.

Rogers allowed a run in the ninth before finishing off the victory.

[Yankee4Life]

Chase Whitley of the New York Yankees throws a pitch in the first inning during a game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Yankee Stadium on September 10, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York.

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Derek Jeter of the New York Yankees runs to first base as he flies out in the first inning against the Tampa Bay Rays Yankee Stadium on September 10, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.

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Adam Warren of the New York Yankees throws a pitch during a game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Yankee Stadium on September 10, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.

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Dellin Betances of the New York Yankees throws a pitch during a game against the Tampa Bay Rays at Yankee Stadium on September 10, 2014 in the Bronx borough of New York City.