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Yankees take Wakefield deep, take out Red Sox

May 22, 2007 - 5:43 AM BRONX, New York (Ticker) -- Still facing a sizeable deficit in the American League East Division, the New York Yankees got off to a good start in their latest series against their biggest rival.

Chien-Ming Wang pitched effectively into the seventh inning and was backed by home runs from Alex Rodriguez and Jason Giambi as the Yankees opened a three-game series against the Boston Red Sox on Monday with a 6-2 victory.

The Yankees (20-23) won consecutive games for the first time in two weeks and for just the fourth time in 12 games. They reached .500 on May 9 and were six games out of first place but dropped 4 1/2 games in the standings on their road trip through Seattle, Chicago and New York.

"We need to play well," New York captain Derek Jeter said. "That's the bottom line. I can't keep saying it's early, it's early. We have to come out here and be ready to play and I like our intensity the last couple of days."

"We won two in a row," Yankees manager Joe Torre added. "It's not usually something we trumpet, but we haven't done it (often)."

New York capped the trip with a well-played 6-2 victory Sunday night at Shea Stadium and that appeared to have a carryover effect Monday as the Yankees moved to within 9 1/2 games of the Red Sox.

"Last night was definitely huge for us," said Yankees center fielder Johnny Damon, who had three hits and a walk. "It seems like every game when you play for the Yankees is a huge game regardless, whether it's Opening Day or what is it May 20 and they're going to be just as important come July or August. So we know what we need to do and just win games."

Rodriguez, who had hit just one home run since April 23 before Saturday, put the Yankees up 2-0 with a long two-run blast into the Boston bullpen beyond the left field fence with two outs in the first. It was Rodriguez's league-leading 18th home run and third in as many games.

"He seems to be back," Torre said. "He's having good swings. He seems a lot more comfortable at the plate."

The Yankees doubled their lead in the second when Giambi hit his first home run since May 3. Giambi's homer landed 10 rows into the upper deck in right field was just his second hit in his last 27 at-bats.

Following a double by Robinson Cano and a two-out base hit by Damon, Jeter extended his hitting streak to 16 games with an RBI base hit to left field.

Wang (3-3) who had allowed four runs and six hits in six innings, against Boston here on April 29, turned in his second straight effective outing. He gave up two runs, seven hits, struck out, walked three in an 114-pitch effort.

"He didn't really have what you would call great stuff, but he kept you in the game," Yankees pitching coach Ron Guidry said. "And that's all you ask for."

The righthander's biggest moment of the night came when he worked out of a bases-loaded jam in the second.

Doug Mirabelli and Alex Cora had consecutive two-out singles and Julio Lugo reached on an error by Jeter at shortstop. But Wang struck out Kevin Youkilis on a slider to avoid confrontations with sluggers David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez.

"He doesn't rattle," Torre said of Wang. "He keeps it together. When he needed to, he threw a strike."

"It (the slider) is a lot better (than last season)," Wang said. "A slider is a good strikeout pitch."

When Wang faced Ortiz and Ramirez in the third, he retired them fairly easily as Ortiz grounded out to second and Ramirez struck out. That began a stretch in which he retired 12 of the next 16 hitters before encountering trouble with one out in the seventh.

After Wang walked Lugo, Youkilis lined a double to left field and manager Torre went to lefthanded specialist Mike Myers to face Ortiz, who lifted a sacrifice fly to make it 6-2. Righthander Brian Bruney came in to face Ramirez and struck him out with a 96 mile per hour fastball.

Bruney recorded the first two outs in the eighth but committed a throwing error on Mirabelli's grounder and was replaced by Scott Proctor, who hit Cora and loaded the bases. Proctor recovered and retired Lugo on a groundout to second.

Boston, which has won five of the first seven meetings with the Yankees, scored its first run in the fifth on Ortiz's RBI double.

Red Sox starter Tim Wakefield (4-5) was reached for a season-worst six runs and nine hits in five innings. He has allowed 11 runs and 18 hits in his last two outings after tossing 14 scoreless innings at Minnesota and Toronto respectively.

"He had a real good one (bullpen) out there," Boston manager Terry Francona said. "A lot of pitches, a lot of deep counts. You give them that many looks it gets tougher."

"I never got comfortable," Wakefield said. "I was never comfortable all night. I didn't have great stuff. I had to grind it out."

He has pitched in Boston's two losses to the Yankees and has lost seven of his last eight decisions to New York dating to May 27, 2005.

"He's tough," Jeter said. "You really don't have an approach against him because nobody knows where the ball is going. You can't say you're going to try to be patient because if you take a strike (it's trouble). So he's always tough, I wasn't aware of his record. It's no fun facing him."

The Yankees tacked on a pair of insurance runs in the fifth when Cano lined a two-run triple to left.

The Red Sox were done in by their inability to get timely hits. They did not get any leadoff hits but stranded 12 and went 1-for-9 with runners in scoring position.

"It's crazy," Ortiz said. "Everyone wishes to have the bases loaded with two outs, but it's baseball (and sometimes you don't get it done)."