MINNEAPOLIS – Visiting hours are 2 TO 4 and 7 TO 9.
These are traditional times for wakes, but this isn’t a public wake for the Yankees. Nevertheless, their supporters are urged to pay their respects privately today for the team that is looking toe-tag dead in the AL East and wild card races.
The pinstriped coffins have been delivered and when the final game at Yankee Stadium is played, it likely will be turned into a cemetery. The headstone will read: March 31-Aug. 13.
Looking to build on a stirring victory Tuesday night the Yankees ended a 10-game road trip with a sloppy, 4-2, loss to the Twins in front of 35,187 today at the Metrodome.
The voyage through Texas, California and Minnesota ended 3-7.
And the finale was repulsive.
“It was a bad game, we played poor defensively and didn’t swing the bats well,” said manager Joe Girardi, whose lineup was held to five hits (1-for-5 with runners in scoring position), committed two errors and made several mental mistakes in the field.
Twins right-hander Kevin Slowey was 0-1 with a 9.00 ERA in two career starts against the Yankees. Less than a month ago they spanked him for four runs and five hits in 5 1/3 innings.
The only run Slowey (9-8) gave up today was in the first. He went six innings and allowed three hits.
The Yankees’ futility went beyond the plate. Alex Rodriguez cost Darrell Rasner a run in the third when he threw late to second for a force instead of first. Cano was charged with an error for not being on the bag for the throw, but Cano said the umpire told him the throw didn’t beat the runner.
Two batters later Delmon Young clubbed his second three-run homer in as many nights on a cutter Rasner (5-9) hung in the middle of the plate.
“I thought the play was maybe to first or a quicker exchange (by Rodriguez),” Girardi said.
Center fielder Melky Cabrera and Cano didn’t get together on Nick Punto’s pop to short center in the seventh and the ball spilled out of Cabrera’s glove for a hit.
“It’s something that shouldn’t happen, they have been playing together too long,” Girardi said.
Wilson Betemit, who filled in for Derek Jeter (sore left foot) and Cano failed to get together on who was covering second on a steal in the eighth, and Ivan “Pudge” Rodriguez’s throw hit Betemit in the left knee.
Because Betemit didn’t tell left fielder Johnny Damon that Justin Morneau was going from second to third on Young’s sacrifice fly, Damon threw to second in the sixth.
The loss lowered the Yankees’ record to 64-57 and pending on Tampa Bay’s outcome tonight the Yankees will be either eight or nine games out of first place with 41 games remaining. Depending on what the Red Sox did, the Yankees are either five or six games out of the wild card lead.
“It was a bad trip, you can’t sugarcoat it,” said Jeter, who vowed to play Friday night against the Royals at Yankee Stadium.
Trailing, 4-2, in the eighth, (the Yankees scored on a wild pitch after Bobby Abreu struck out) they had Alex Rodriguez against right-hander Jesse Crain and the count, 3-1, in Rodriguez’s favor with runners at the corners and two outs. With one swing, Rodriguez had a chance to erase the ugliness and put the Yankees ahead like he did Tuesday in the 12th inning. Instead, he lofted a lazy fly to center, likely signaling the end of the Yankees’ season under the Metrodome’s pewter roof.