JUST MISSED: Brennan Boesch slides under the tag of Russell Martin to score during the Yankees’ 6-5 loss to the Tigers last night.
DETROIT — Eric Chavez and Russell Martin don’t subscribe to the theory that the Yankees are simply experiencing minor turbulence.
The third baseman and catcher understand the rut the Yankees are in is deeper than some believe.
“You should be concerned, anybody who says they aren’t is lying,” Chavez said following a 6-5 loss last night to the sizzling Tigers in front of 39,760 at Comerica Park. “We have to find ways to win games. Yeah, it’s a concern.”
And it’s proof, according to Chavez, that the Yankees miss Alex Rodriguez who they are 4-7 without.
“Alex is a huge part of the lineup and it’s showing how big of a part of our team he is,” Chavez said.
The concern should be real because the Yankees have dropped 12 of 18. And with the Orioles comeback win over the Mariners last night, the Yankees AL East lead is down to 4 1/2 games. That’s the smallest lead they have had since June 29 when they were four games up.
“We are not playing very good,” Martin said. “We have to pick it up. Hopefully we can win the next two and get a split.”
A ninth-inning rally against Tigers closer Jose Valverde pulled the Yankees to within a run and placed the struggling Curtis Granderson at the plate with runners on second and third and two outs. Granderson popped up to end the game and extend his slump to 2-for-20 with six strikeouts since being elevated from second to first in the lineup five games ago.
Martin’s double to left scored Raul Ibanez for the Yankees’ fifth run but didn’t get Ichiro Suzuki home from first to tie the score.
“No chance,” manager Joe Girardi said of Ichiro’s chance of scoring. “The guy would have had to throw it up in the seats.”
Tied, 2-2, in the fifth Phil Hughes put the Yankees in a 4-2 hole when Miguel Cabrera doubled home two runs an inning after crushing a hanging 2-0 breaking ball into the left-field seats for his 29th homer. The Tigers added a run in the off Cody Eppley in the sixth and another against Joba Chamberlain in the eighth.
“He is a tough out all the time,” Hughes said of Cabrera. “I tried to get a breaking ball for a strike and he stayed on it pretty good. He is one of the best hitters in the game for a reason.”
Chavez’s two-run, opposite-field homer to left in the fourth off Seton Hall Prep product Rick Porcello staked Hughes to a 2-0 lead in the fourth.
Hughes, who needed 42 pitches to get through the fourth, fell to 11-9. In 4 1/3 innings he gave up four runs and eight hits.
Chavez started the ninth-inning rally with a one-out single and Ibanez climbed out of a 0-2 hole to draw a two-out walk. Ichiro drove in a run with a single and Martin doubled another home.
That brought Granderson to the plate with the same disappointing result.
“I am just not putting the ball in play the way I want to,” said Granderson, who fanned in the first and third innings, grounded out in the fifth and popped out in the eighth. “I am still getting pitches to hit. It doesn’t make a difference if you are hitting first, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth or ninth, when you are not hitting you are not hitting. I am getting balls around the middle of the plate and not being able to do what I want to.”
Girardi pointed to the Yankees starting the season 0-3 and getting straightened out.
“The first month we struggled and came out of it,” said Girardi, whose club was 13-9 in April. “We will come out of it. Every club comes out of it.”