Two outs away from celebrating a victory swimming in milestones, the Yankees watched in horror as Mariano Rivera blew a save opportunity for the third straight outing.
It was the first time in Rivera’s career baseball’s all-time leading closer has blown three saves in a row. Rivera, sure to be headed to the Hall of Fame, has five blown saves in 40 chances this season.
Asked to protect a two-run lead in the ninth, Rivera gave up solo homers to Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez.
Brett Gardner’s two-out homer in the bottom of the ninth took the sting out of Rivera’s outing and lifted the Yankees to a 5-4 victory that was witnessed by a Yankee Stadium crowd of 42,439.
Rivera flushed save chances in Chicago on Wednesday and against the Tigers on Friday. The Yankees lost to the White Sox, but rebounded to win Friday night.
With thick millstones secured to their expensive necks, the Yankees and appealing/appalling Alex Rodriguez turned yesterday into Milestone Sunday.
Their deficit in the AL East was in double digits, they trailed four clubs for the second wild-card spot and had lost five of six.
Yet, for eight innings at least, all appeared calm in the turbulent Yankees universe — until Rivera melted in the ninth.
Alfonso Soriano and Rodriguez homered off Justin Verlander and combined to drive in three runs. After manager Joe Girardi yanked Andy Pettitte two outs shy of qualifying for the victory, the middle of the Yankees bullpen was solid until David Robertson started the leak and Rivera opened the valve.
Rodriguez’s first homer this season, his 648th career blast, was a towering drive to left that splashed down in the 13th row in the second inning. Rodriguez added an RBI single in the third.
The homer pulled Rodriguez to within a dozen of tying Willie Mays for fourth place on the all-time list. If Rodriguez catches Mays, he will be paid a $6 million bonus. There are four more $6 million bonuses in play for Rodriguez, who would have to break Barry Bonds’ all-time record of 762 to earn all of them.
The two RBIs hiked Rodriguez’s career total to 1,952 and moved him out of a tie for fifth place with Stan Musial. Babe Ruth is fourth with 1,992.
Soriano started the day hitting .200 (10-for-50) in 13 games as a Yankee and was hitless in his previous 10 at-bats when he drove Verlander’s first pitch of the fourth inning into the left-field seats for his third homer since returning to the Yankees.
It was Soriano’s 2,000th career hit. He is one of 16 active players to reach that milestone.
Pettitte, who hasn’t won since July 11 (five starts), gave up a run and eight hits in 4 ¹/₃ innings. He needed 101 pitches to record 13 outs.
With the bases loaded, the Yankees leading by two runs and one out, Girardi lifted Pettitte for right-hander Shawn Kelley.
Kelley made the move look wonderful by striking out Hernan Perez and retiring Brayan Pena on a fly to center.
Boone Logan entered a two-out, two-on jam in the sixth and got Prince Fielder on a routine fly to left.
Robertson surrendered a leadoff homer to Pena in the eighth that cut the Yankees’ lead to 4-2, but the Yankees received a break when second base umpire Will Little blew a call.
With Jose Iglesias on first and no outs, Rodriguez fielded Austin Jackson’s grounder near the third-base bag and fired to second, where Iglesias clearly beat the ball. However, Little called Iglesias out.
Gardner followed that by crashing into the center-field fence while catching Torii Hunter’s drive and turned that into an inning-ending double play.
Gardner, who slumped to the warning track, rolled the ball to Soriano.
Soriano got the ball to Eduardo Nunez, and his throw to Robinson Cano doubled up Jackson at second.
That Rodriguez homered off Verlander wasn’t a shock. He started the game hitting .333 (8-for-24) with three homers off the stud right-hander.
george.king@nypost.com