ST . PETERSBURG, Fla. — The Yankees can’t ride Alfonso Soriano’s legs into October, but yesterday they used his pins and wise head to avoid getting buried in two races.
One inning after Ichiro Suzuki selfishly attempted to bunt his way on with Alex Rodriguez at second, the score tied and one out, Soriano allowed the Yankees to leave Tropicana Field with a much-needed 3-2 victory in 11 innings.
Soriano’s bat set the win up but his legs and head delivered the victory that moved the Yankees to within 3 1/2 games of the Athletics in the race for the second AL wild-card ticket.
“I don’t have the speed I used to have, but now I have the experience,’’ said the 37-year-old Soriano, who averaged 39.7 steals in three seasons with the Yankees and led the AL with 41 in 2002.
The bat the Yankees desperately needed to juice a lineup that was drowning in oxygen in late July provided a one-out double to left in the 11th. With Curtis Granderson at the plate and Jamey Wright on the mound, Soriano eyed the big right-hander on the first pitch and when Wright looked at him twice before throwing home on the next delivery, Soriano broke for third.
“Most pitchers don’t look three times,’’ said Soriano, who knew Wright was between 1.5 and 1.8 seconds delivering the ball to the plate and stumbled after breaking off second, but beat the throw with a head-first slide.
From there he walked home on Granderson’s sacrifice fly.
A loss certainly wouldn’t have eliminated the Yankees from the AL East chase or the wild-card race. But it would have reduced the Yankees’ margin for losing — very narrow as it was — even further and tightened the pressure on everyone.
“They are the team we have to beat if we want to go to the playoffs,’’ Soriano said of the Rays, who started yesterday percentage points ahead of the Red Sox for the AL East lead. “Now we have momentum going to Toronto.’’
When the Yankees arrive at Rogers Centre today for the first of three games versus the lowly Blue Jays, against whom they are 12-1 against this season, they will greet Derek Jeter.
There was a time when getting Jeter back from the disabled list would conjur up images of three-hit games and clutch at-bats. But the 39-year-old Jeter is coming back for the third time from the DL, has played in five big league games all year and is hitting .211 (4-for-19).
When last seen in San Diego on Aug. 2, Jeter was hobbled with a right calf problem that landed him on the DL.
Whatever Jeter supplies will, of course, be accepted. Eduardo Nunez has been adequate filling in at short but if Jeter is healthy he will play.
More importantly, after dropping two of three to the Rays and scoring a scant seven runs in three games, the Yankees have to find ways to beat the Blue Jays before a three-game series with the Orioles starts Friday at Yankee Stadium.
“Each day that ticks off we’ve got to make up more ground,’’ manager Joe Girardi said. “This is obviously one of the teams we are chasing and this has been a tough place for us to win. This group has been resilient. People have wrote us off a few times and they find a way to bounce back and that’s what we did today.’’
They talk about catching the Rays and Red Sox and it’s just that. If the Yankees play in October — and that is a long shot at this point — it will start with a one-game playoff against the other wild-card club.
And the Yankees would be better served relying on their bats and arms instead of Soriano’s legs to get them there.
