IT TO RED SOX
Hits 2 of Yanks’ 5 HRs; Jeter’s blast is No. 250
THE GREATEST rivalry in baseball is looking pretty one-sided these days.
The Yankees broke out their big bats against the Red Sox on Friday night, bashing five home runs in a 6-4 win over their hated rivals at the Stadium.
While the fans were treated to an aerial display — the five home runs matched their season-high, set back on April 20 at Fenway Park — it was a clutch two-out single by Jayson Nix that put the Bombers ahead for good in the seventh.
“I’ve never tried to hit homers,” Nix said. “It’s great to see those guys do it; that’s what they’re supposed to do. I don’t try to do too much. I just try to have quality at-bats and swing at good pitches.”
Nick Swisher homered twice, while Curtis Granderson, Russell Martin and Derek Jeter also went deep, with the Yankee captain slugging career blast No. 250.
“Up and down our lineup we’re getting contributions from a lot of different people,” Jeter said. “If you do that, you’re going to win a lot of games, and that’s what we’ve been able to do.” Phil Hughes coughed up a three-run lead in the third, allowing four unearned runs thanks his own throwing error while trying to turn a double play, but the righthander bounced back with four stellar innings to end his night.
Hughes (12-10) finished his outing by retiring 13 of the final 15 batters he faced. He allowed four runs on four hits and one walk while striking out four in seven innings.
“Getting a three-run lead and then giving it away is tough, but the guys battled,” Hughes said. “Nixy with a big two-out hit, everybody stepped up, so it was great.”
Dave Robertson pitched a scoreless eighth, setting up Rafael Soriano for his 30th save of the season.
The Yankees — who are 13½ games ahead of the Red Sox — have won seven of 10 meetings with their rivals this season.
“I don’t really pay attention to the standings now,” Jeter said. “Anything’s possible. Right now we need to worry about ourselves and continue to play well. Every time we face them and play them it’s tough games, but you can’t look at the scoreboard.”
Swisher gave the Yankees a quick lead against lefty Franklin Morales (3-4) with one out in the first, belting his 17th home run of the season — a shot to left — for a 1-0 lead. Granderson and Martin went backto-back in the second — both to right — pushing the lead to three.
Hughes looked sharp early, ignoring bursts of heavy rain to set the Red Sox down in order in the first two innings. Hughes’ throwing error gave Boston runners at the corners with nobody out in the third. The Sox went on to score four runs in the inning, three on Dustin Pedroia’s line-drive homer to left. “He just left a fastball in Pedroia’s happy zone,” Martin said. “Besides that, I thought he did a great job.”
Jeter tied the game in the fifth with a homer to left, tying him with Graig Nettles for ninth on the Yankees’ all-time list with 250. “I always hear all the time that I don’t hit home runs,” Jeter said. “But in my mind that’s a lot of ’em.”
Casey McGehee and Granderson hit one-out singles in the seventh, ending Morales’ night. Clayton Mortensen came in and struck out Martin, but Nix delivered a big two-out soft single to right, scoring McGehee to put the Yankees ahead by a run. “I don’t know how he does it, to be quite honest with you, not playing every day,” Jeter said. “But he’s played great defensively at multiple positions, and he’s had some big hits for us.”
Swisher added another shot in the seventh — this one to right off Mortensen — stretching the lead to 6-4 with his 19th career multihomer game. It was also the 12th time in Swisher’s career that he’s gone deep from both sides of the plate, second all-time behind Mark Teixeira’s 13. He’s had at least one run and one RBI in each of his last six games, tying Alex Rodriguez for the longest such streak by a Yankee since 1988.
“The way the game started, it’s raining like crazy, two teams battling it out, the field’s getting nasty; it just felt like a Yankees-Red Sox rivalry game,” Swisher said. “I love these games, man.”