GRAND TIMING: Nick Swisher watches his fourth-inning grand slam sail into right field during the Yankees’ 10-7 victory over the Blue Jays last night. (
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He dresses in a room with others who have wide shoulders, thick muscles and not a speck of grey on their domes.
None of those attributes belongs to Ichiro Suzuki. The flecks of grey in his hair are easy to spot. His shoulders are narrow and the muscles are tight; not bulging.
Yet, as the Yankees near the finish line looking to hold off the Orioles in an ultra-tight AL East race, they are riding on Ichiro’s strong back.
“The city is my home,’’ Ichiro said following a closer-than-it-should-have-been 10-7 win last night over the hapless Blue Jays in front of 40,511 at Yankee Stadium.
If New York City is Ichiro’s home, the Stadium is his parlor. After going 7-for-8 in two victories Wednesday, Ichiro went 2-for-4 with a homer and three RBIs last night.
“I haven’t changed my approach to the game,’’ said the lefty-swinging Suzuki, who started against a lefty for the second straight game. “It’s the same routine and the same approach, just different results.’’
That’s for sure. Suddenly, the player acquired from the Mariners looks 30 instead of 38 and appears quite capable of carrying the Yankees over the regular-season’s final 13 games.
The Yankees’ fifth straight win upped their lead over the second-place and idle Orioles to one game. When the Yankees open a three-game series at the Stadium tonight the Birds are scheduled to do the same in Fenway Park.
“The only thing stopping [Ichiro’s] balls lately are the seats and the walls,’’ said Nick Swisher, who added a grand slam in the seven-run fourth inning. “I don’t know what he is doing or what he is eating, but I want him to keep doing it.’’
The Yankees’ seventh win in eight games should have been easier. Thanks to a misbehaving fastball, Phil Hughes’ pitch count was at 102 after five innings and he was gone despite the Yankees leading 10-4.
“It was a struggle for sure. I was trying to figure things out on the fly,’’ said Hughes, who won his third straight and is 16-12. “My fastball was all over the place. It was a nice night to get a lot of runs, I definitely needed them.’’
Knowing he was staying away from closer Rafael Soriano, who threw lightly in the bullpen during the eighth inning on his own, Joe Girardi didn’t remove his starters with a 10-4 lead going to the top of the eighth.
Cory Wade and Joba Chamberlain combined to turn a six-run bulge into a three-run advantage. After a leadoff walk to Swisher was followed by strikeouts from Robinson Cano, Alex Rodriguez and Russell Martin in the home eighth, Girardi summoned David Robertson for the ninth.
Robertson, who gave up two runs and four hits in two-thirds of an inning in the first game Wednesday, hurled a perfect ninth for his second save.
“We are winning games, it doesn’t matter how,’’ Robertson said.
For the past three wins it’s easy to see how: Ichiro. In the three victories he is 9-for-12 (.750), scored four runs, drove in four and swiped four bases. And he made a game-saving catch in the first game Wednesday.
“He is in a really good place right now,’’ said Girardi, who used Ichiro over the slumping Andruw Jones for the second straight game versus a lefty starter.
“Having this momentum at this point of the season is the Yankees,’’ said Ichiro, the man who is providing that momentum.