ARLINGTON, Texas — When the ball left Adrian Beltre’s bat it sure looked like the Yankees were headed for a horrific loss.
They had erased a three-run deficit with a seven-run sixth inning and had a six-run bulge going into the home seventh.
Now, Beltre had launched a high fly ball to left with the bases loaded, two outs, the count full and the Yankees ahead by a skinny run in the home ninth.
As left fielder Brett Gardner drifted back the hearts that weren’t in Yankee throats were racing a big quicker. Did Beltre get enough to muscle it out of Globe Life Park?
“I could tell by him that he didn’t hit it out. He wasn’t celebrating,’’ said David Robertson after the Yankees survived a miserable ninth inning by their closer and escaped with a hard-to-look-at 12-11 victory that was witnessed by 41,934. “With a 3-2 count, that is as bad as you can suck out there and get one of the better hitters in baseball out. I feel like the luckiest man on earth right now to escape. I couldn’t find the strike zone, three walks, two hits and two runs and I managed to get the job done. I fell apart out there.’’
On a night Gardner’s Texas tear continued with a 4-for-5 game that included a third homer in the last two games to spark what has been a morbid Yankees’ lineup, relievers Adam Warren, Dellin Betances and Robertson almost flushed the victory that kept the Yankees 4 ½ lengths back of the AL East-leading Orioles.
“I would not have been real fun to talk to if I had blown that,’’ said Robertson, who bagged his 27th save in 29 chances.
Robertson’s miserable ninth followed Betances giving up a grand slam to J.P. Arencibia in the seventh after Warren left Betances with a bases-loaded, one-out jam.
“My mechanics felt off,’’ said Warren, who walked two and gave up a single. “I take pride in my mechanics and I was out of sync.’’
Betances gave up a triple to Leonys Martin following Arencibia’s slam, his second homer of the game that hiked his RBI total to seven. The reliever then fanned Robinson Chirinos, walked Rougned Odor, the No. 9 hitter, and then whiffed Shin-Soo Choo to strand two.
“At 3-2 I didn’t want to walk him,’’ Betances said of Arencibia, who swatted a 97 mph fastball over the left-field wall. “It wasn’t a strike but he put a good swing on it. I think winning the game makes the bullpen feel better. It was tough, but a win changes everything.’’
Gardner led a 12-hit parade that included a two-run homer by Mark Teixeira in his first game back in the starting lineup after sitting out eight tilts with a back issue. Derek Jeter got two hits and at 3,422 is eight hits back of tying Honus Wagner for sixth place on the all-time list.
Brandon McCarthy was the winner and is 3-0 in four Yankees starts.
“Give them a hiccup,’’ Teixeira said of the bullpen. “We haven’t been picking them up, they have been picking us up all year long.’’
Gardner, who has a career-high 13 homers and trails team-leader Teixeira by five, admitted the obvious.
“It shouldn’t have been as close as it was,’’ Gardner said.