CHICAGO — Late afternoon, the Yankees up six, and a visiting crowd offering a standing ovation to the retiring captain as he steps to the plate. Even a “Derek Jeter!” chant in a city for which he has a particular fondness.
If Jeter could bottle this moment and replicate it the rest of the way, for every “final at-bat” to come, surely he would.
“I was trying to get a hit, man,” he said afterward, disagreeing with The Post’s premise. “I struck out, so I didn’t enjoy it.”
Ah, but prior to that strikeout came four hits, including his first triple in nearly three years. So if Jeter wouldn’t bottle this? His team surely would.
“I’ve been hearing for years that he is done,” Yankees third-base coach Rob Thomson said following the Yankees’ 7-1 victory over the White Sox at U.S. Cellular Field. “You never count this guy out.”
His defensive range is arguably more limited than ever, and he began the day with a .302 slugging percentage, which was fourth-worst in the American League among hitters who qualify for the batting title. Yet his current slash line, following his first four-hit day since Aug. 20, 2012, (also on Chicago’s South Side), is .275/.342/.329. If that isn’t prime Jeter, it is far from embarrassing.
“That’s the great thing about our game,” Joe Girardi said, “you never know what to expect.”
It was reasonable to expect Jeter to get Sunday off, since he started the first six games of this one-hotel, two-ballpark trip to Chicago, and he looked particularly feeble Saturday, going 0-for-5. Yet maybe Girardi read Joel Sherman’s Post column from Thursday that detailed Jeter’s profound struggles against right-handers who throw 93 mph or harder.
Andre Rienzo, Chicago’s right-handed starter, averaged 92.1 mph with his four-seam fastball on Sunday, according to Brooks Baseball. Michael Wacha, the Cardinals’ young righty stud whom the Yankees will face Monday in the series opener at Busch Stadium, averages 93.2 mph, according to FanGraphs. So perhaps Jeter will get Memorial Day off.
If so, he’ll have some good short-term memories to contemplate. After White Sox retiring icon Paul Konerko gave Jeter a bench made of bats and balls (cute), some dirt from this ballpark (lame) and a $5,000 check (on the low side, to be polite) to Jeter’s Turn 2 Foundation in a pregame ceremony, Jeter went right to work, lining a single to right-center field in the first inning. In the second, he dropped a soft line drive into right, scoring Brian Roberts from third base.
In the fourth, with one out, he powered a ball to right-center. Perhaps in Jeter’s salad days, the White Sox outfielders would have been playing deeper and tracked it down. But Jeter’s lack of pop this season requires outfielders defense him differently, so Chicago center fielder Adam Eaton dove for it and missed it, and Jeter recorded his first three-bagger since Aug. 25, 2011, against Oakland.
Quite notably, too, this marked Jeter’s first triple since his career-changing broken left ankle in October 2012. There’s no better test of a hitter’s legs than a triple, after all (well, except for an inside-the-park homer).
“Like I’ve told you guys, I’ve worked extremely hard. I’m very happy with how I feel. So I don’t think it was a test,” Jeter said, going 2-for-2 in refuting Post premises. “It’s good to have [a triple] as opposed to having none.”
Jeter subsequently scored on a Rienzo wild pitch, and in the sixth, his base hit to center field scored Alfonso Soriano from third base for Jeter’s second RBI of the day.
Masahiro Tanaka rebounded from his first major-league loss with a solid outing and the Yankees knotted the series at 2-2 and their Chicago stay at 3-3. The Yankees left town for St. Louis with a renewed optimism.
“We stay confident. We continue to battle,” Jeter said. “You have to keep working. This is not a football season. You play every single day.”
Some days are better than others. For Jeter, wrapping up one of the best careers in the sports history, this one had to feel especially sweet. Even if he wouldn’t quite acknowledge that.