Yankees have positive day

ANAHEIM, CALIF. The New York Yankees desperately needed a good day, and from coast to coast, Sunday was a good day.

In New York, an earlymorning MRI revealed nothing more than inflammation in Mark Teixeira’s sore right wrist, a best- case diagnosis suggesting his lingering discomfort is possibly just a bump in the road, not the end of the line.

A five- run third inning gave the Yankees their best offensive game in more than a week, a 6- 5 win against the Los Angeles Angels that broke a five- game losing streak to cap a brutal West Coast trip.

“It doesn’t matter how we did it. We got a win,” reliever David Robertson said.

The Yankees endured both insult and injury in California. They were swept in Oakland, where CC Sabathia stumbled in front of his hometown, and were one loss away from another sweep here, where Kevin Youkilis and Teixeira suffered health setbacks.

Teixeira was rushed to New York on Saturday night, and team physician Christopher Ahmad found he hadn’t retorn the tendon sheath in his right wrist. Instead, his lingering discomfort was caused by inflammation, likely connected to his spring training injury but not a cause for surgery.

“If he was to retear it, that would probably be it for the season,” manager Joe Girardi said. “We’re looking at inflammation, and we’ll have to see how long they think it’s going to take to get out.”

Teixeira was not placed on the disabled list, but Girardi acknowledged it’s still a possibility, barely two weeks after Teixeira was activated May 31.

Without him, the Yankees had to snap out of an offensive funk with a lineup similar to the patchwork group that played most of the first two months.

Travis Hafner, who had five hits in his last 14 games, clobbered a slider to center field for a three- run homer in the third, driving in more runs than the Yankees scored in any of their last four games.

“Guys definitely loosened up after that ( home run),” Hafner said. “It was good to have some fun there offensively.”