DETROIT — Kevin Long faced a circle of inquisitors yesterday morning in the Comerica Park visitors’ clubhouse, each wanting to discuss his charges’ failure to deliver with runners in scoring position. Derek Jeter scurried by, like a car passing in the left lane, and mocked what he saw before him.
“Will we score again this year, Kevin?” the Yankees’ captain, feigning concern, asked his hitting coach.
“What do you think, Derek?” a smiling Long responded.
Jeter, his back already to the crowd, finished: “Probably not.”
Talk about tanking your own predictions. Jeter hit the game’s very first pitch, a changeup from reigning American League Most Valuable Player and Cy Young Award winner Justin Verlander, over the right-field wall. The Yankees proceeded to defeat Verlander and the Tigers, 5-1, to win the rubber game and head home with a 6-3 showing on their three-city road trip.
Phil Hughes deserves credit for recording the first nine-inning complete game of his career, allowing just four hits and three walks while striking out eight, and Alex Rodriguez crushed a third-inning solo homer off Verlander to boost the Yankees’ lead. Yet on days like this, Jeter being Jeter feels particularly valuable.
Off a tough, 4-3 loss to the Tigers on Saturday night, in which the Yankees went 1-for-12 with runners in scoring position, Jeter asserted his lack of concern with his pre-game quips, and he backed it up with the 27th leadoff homer of his career, just his second extra-base hit since May 6.
“I called him Rickey Henderson,” Rodriguez said.
“He’s amazing,” Long said. “Just how relaxed, how loose [he is], his approach to the game. You really marvel at it, because he truly is the same guy every day.
“He really keeps things as simplistic as they can be. And he enjoys himself. That’s what he brought to the table today. Especially after a day where it was kind of ugly. It felt like we should’ve won a game [Saturday], and he comes out, first pitch, home run. Set the whole tone for the day.”
Jeter, asked whether some of his teammates struggle to see the big picture as easily as he can, said, “Nope. Not at all.” He hates negative questions from the media, which is what sparked his earlier exchange with Long.
That written, Jeter has a point right now. At 29-24, the Yankees are a game in the loss column behind the AL East-leading Rays, who come to The Bronx tomorrow for a three-game set. Their “offensive woes,” as Jeter called them in another fake query to Long, have been overstated, as their .338 on-base percentage ranks second in the AL behind the Rangers.
They rank fifth with 249 runs, a standing that will improve if and when the Yankees start hitting more in the clutch. They went 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position yesterday.
“We understand, you play a lot of games, you’re going to have periods when you swing the bats well and periods when you struggle,” Jeter said. “That happens every single year on every single team. Obviously, you’d like to come out here every day and get hits all of the time, but it’s not going to happen.
“But you keep working at it, and you hope that it turns for the better. We scored some runs today, but we still have work to do.”
While Jeter has been far from perfect in his captaincy — see: “relationship with A-Rod, 2004-08” — his greatest attribute arguably has been his daily belief that he and his team will prevail. That manifests itself in important moments like yesterday. It puts runs on the board, and it surely helps his teammates relax.
“He’s serious about what he does, but in the same breath, he’s not going to stress out,” Long said. “He’s not going to worry. We could all learn from him.”
This slow last month, after his great start to the season, reminds us that Jeter turns 38 in a few weeks. However, his statistics as a whole put him in the All-Star Game conversation. And a sequence like yesterday’s still makes him revered, both in the stands and in his own clubhouse.
kdavidoff@nypost.com