Indians 6 Yankees 1

CLEVELAND – Pathetic.

When Pedro Martinez, Mike Mussina, David Wells or Chuck Finley make you look ill at the plate, you doff your cap because they are the elite arms in the AL. But when unknown

Paul Rigdon in his major-league debut turns your wood to dust on the way to a rocking-chair 6-1 Indians victory, that hat can be used as a comfort bag.

Watching Rigdon limit the Yankees to two hits in seven innings with good, but not filthy, stuff only reinforced the belief that the time has arrived for the Yankees to acquire a legitimate bat to drop in the middle of a lineup that has to shoulder most of the blame for the club losing seven of nine and falling to 24-16.

The latest show by Men Without Bats accompanied a poor outing by Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez, who gave up three homers, one of which was an inside-the-park dinger by Enrique Wilson. After pitching well but losing in his last two outings due to poor support, El Duque again didn’t receive help yesterday but he wasn’t sharp. In six-plus innings, El Duque gave up six runs (five earned) and nine hits. Jim Thome and Manny Ramirez homered for

the Tribe, which took two of three from the Yankees much to the delight of 42,587 who fell in love immediately with Rigdon.

“The results explained how I pitched,” said a disgusted El Duque, who fell to 4-4 with his fourth straight loss. El Duque, who hasn’t won since April 23, is tied for the AL lead in homers given up at 15.

Thanks to the Tigers beating the Red Sox for the second straight day, the Yankees stayed one game behind the AL East leaders.

Rigdon, a 24-year-old right-hander the Yankees had the barest of scouting reports on, was toiling in Triple-A until getting called up Friday. Sure, he pitched effectively for Buffalo, going 4-1 with a 3.07 ERA. However, this was Jacobs Field and the Yankees. Even with a lineup that has been struggling, the Yankees had enough muscle to unnerve the neophyte, right?

Derek Jeter may be out and Shane Spencer’s sizzling bat was shut down by a cranky hamstring but Chuck Knoblauch, Bernie Williams, Paul O’Neill, Tino Martinez and Jorge Posada were batting one through five in Joe Torre’s lineup.

And still, nothing more than a single by Knoblauch in the third and a double by Posada in the seventh.

“You didn’t walk away from the plate thinking you didn’t have a chance,” Brosius said of Rigdon, who got 13 ground-ball outs. “There wasn’t a single pitch that scared you.”

Walking to the bullpen before the game, the butterflies were alive in Rigdon’s belly. Warming up on the mound, the nervousness grew.

“But after the first strike to Knoblauch, that was the ice breaker,” Rigdon said. “I told myself, ‘I am here.’ “

Alfonso Soriano’s second error in three games since arriving from Columbus (Triple-A) and sixth of the season led to an unearned run in the first before El Duque slipped a 3-2 pitch by Travis Fryman to end the frame with the bases loaded.

The Indians didn’t lose much starting Wilson at DH while David Justice nurses a sore groin because Justice is 2-for-10 (.200) against El Duque.

Wilson, a switch-hitting infielder won’t soon forget his first at-bat against El Duque since it resulted in an inside-the-park homer that boosted the Tribe’s lead to 2-0 in the second.

Wilson hit a drive that sent O’Neill to the wall in right and when O’Neill leaped, he not only missed the ball but crumpled to the warning track as the ball collided with the wall and bounced back toward the infield. Williams hustled from center to retrieve the ball and throw it to Knoblauch in short right field. With Wilson rolling around third, Knoblauch didn’t give himself a chance to throw Wilson out a the plate by firing high over Posada’s head.

“I got lost out there,” O’Neill said. “It got lost in the sun and I missed it. The ball went off my glove. Any time the ball goes off a glove, you should catch it.”

As for Rigdon, O’Neill didn’t have much to say after grounding back to him twice and drawing a walk.

“He made us put the ball in play and he has a great defense behind him,” O’Neill said. “It was a day that you are not real happy about when it’s over.”

Thome’s opposite-field, two-run homer above the left-field scoreboard in the third raised the Indians’ lead to 4-0.

“He wasn’t overpowering, obviously,” Torre said of Rigdon, whose fastball was clocked at 90 mph. “He made some good pitches and got ahead of hitters. Once he got his legs under him the first couple of innings, it was clear sailing and we didn’t challenge him. Today was frustrating because we didn’t have very many good at-bats.”