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Jeter, Yankees split doubleheader with first-place Rays

Sep 14, 2008 - 4:19 AM By Larry Fleisher PA SportsTicker Contributing Writer

BRONX, New York (Ticker) -- After a frustrating afternoon, the New York Yankees staged a late rally and denied the Tampa Bay Rays their first doubleheader sweep in franchise history.

Xavier Nady's RBI base hit with two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning snapped a tie and lifted the Yankees to a 6-5 victory over the first-place Rays in the second game of a day-night doubleheader on Saturday.

Captain Derek Jeter went 3-for-3 and moved to within three of Hall of Famer Lou Gehrig's record of 1,269 hits at Yankee Stadium. He also had three hits in New York's ugly 7-1 loss in the opener.

"We're just trying to win games," Jeter said. "The first game didn't go the way we wanted, but we bounced back."

Ben Zobrist hit a grand slam in the fourth inning off Sidney Ponson but also made one of three errors for Tampa Bay (88-58), which had a three-game winning streak snapped to move two games ahead of the Boston Red Sox (87-61) in the American League East Division.

"We made way too many mistakes," Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon said after watching his club make three errors for just the second time all season. "We kind of beat ourselves. We want to win two but we'll take it."

The Rays also lost for just the fourth time in 67 games when leading through six innings and failed to win a doubleheader for the first time in 13 tries during their existence.

Jeter's performance was one of the only highlights for the Yankees earlier Saturday, but they provided some more by staging a seventh-inning comeback against J.P. Howell (6-1) and Grant Balfour.

The comeback started with one out when Jeter beat out an infield single, and then New York capitalized on shoddy defense by Tampa Bay.

Bobby Abreu hit an apparent forceout to Zobrist, but the shortstop was charged with a throwing error when he overthrew Akinori Iwamura at second, allowing Jeter to take third. Jeter stopped at third and then scored when Gabe Gross bobbled the ball for an error.

"I could have taken my time and flipped it," Zobrist said. "It just slipped out of my hand."

After Howell struck out Alex Rodriguez for the second out, Balfour came on to face Nady. On the second pitch of the at-bat, Abreu took third on a wild pitch and Nady capped a nine-pitch at-bat with a line drive single to center field.

"I got a lot of fastballs," Nady said. "And fortunately, I was able to sneak one in there."

Abreu added an RBI single in the eighth as the Yankees avoided a third straight loss and won for just the third time in nine games.

The comeback made a winner out of Damaso Marte (1-3), who struck out two in the seventh. Marte came on after rookie Phil Coke pitched 2 2/3 scoreless frames in relief of Sidney Ponson, who allowed four runs and six hits in 3 1/3 innings.

Joba Chamberlain pitched a hitless eighth, Mariano Rivera allowed a two-out RBI single to pinch hitter Evan Longoria in the ninth but retired rookie Justin Ruggiano for his 34th save in 35 opportunities.

Ponson was gone after laboring through 82 pitches. His night ended after Zobrist's second career grand slam.

The Yankees, who played the first two contests in the final homestand here, began their comeback with two in the bottom half off Matt Garza, who allowed a homer to Wilson Betemit and an RBI groundout to Brett Gardner.

"It's a long day for everyone involved," Yankees manager Joe Girardi said. "You want to take two but, after losing the first one, we did the best thing that we could - we split. It's a day where we saw a lot of good things and it's a day where we saw some bad things."