Carlos Beltran returned to the lineup after missing three straight games with a sore right elbow, and he didn’t waste time making his presence felt.
Beltran singled and scored in the fourth then homered to right to lead off the sixth in the Yankees’ 5-3 victory over the White Sox Saturday at the Stadium.
“I’m fine,” Beltran said. “Honestly, I don’t want to talk about it anymore. It’s an issue I have there, but I come to the ballpark and try to get into the lineup.”
Beltran received a cortisone shot Wednesday after the bone spur near his elbow acted up again. He took swings on Friday that went well enough that manager Joe Girardi said Beltran would have been able to pinch hit if he had been needed.
“We thought about pinch-hitting him [Friday] night,” Girardi said before the game. “That’s how encouraged we were with it.”
Beltran reached base three times in his first game back, showing signs of shaking off his prolonged slump. Entering Saturday, he had been hitless in 14 at-bats and had just two hits in 28 at-bats.
Beltran also hadn’t homered or driven in a run since going 2-for-5 with a homer and five RBIs on Aug. 8.
Asked if the injury had sapped some of his power, Beltran said, “I don’t know. I know I’m limited, but at the end of the day, I just don’t want to think or talk about it anymore.”
Though Girardi used Beltran as the designated, both insisted the recurrence of the injury was not caused by playing right field.
Mark Teixeira was hit by a pitch on his right shin in the eighth. He waved off trainer Steve Donohue and remained in the game, but Girardi said he had “some concern” about it heading into Sunday.
The Yankees did not strike out on Saturday for the first time since May 12, 2011 versus Kansas City, a stretch of 577 consecutive games with at least one strikeout.
Derek Jeter got the day off, not unusual for a day game after a night game.
With Stephen Drew taking Jeter’s spot at shortstop, it led Girardi to shuffle his lineup a bit, shifting Jacoby Ellsbury to the leadoff spot, with Brett Gardner second and Brian McCann third.
Girardi often has talked about how he doesn’t like to have back-to-back lefties in the order, but on Saturday, the entire top of the order hit from the left side against right-handed starter Scott Carroll.
Girardi attributed that to the White Sox sending down Eric Surkamp, who was their only southpaw in the bullpen, but was optioned to Triple-A Charlotte following Friday’s game.
The new-look top of the order didn’t produce much, as the combination of Ellsbury and Gardner went 0-for-8.