Leyritz Wears Out Yankees

Yankee Stadium fans rose to salute Jim Leyritz after the Angel catcher’s second-inning home run Tuesday night, again showing their appreciation for Leyritz’s contributions to the Yankees’ 1996 World Series championship. But Leyritz may have worn out his welcome by the ninth.

Leyritz lined a two-out, two-run double into the gap in left center off the once-invincible Mariano Rivera, lifting the Angels to a riveting, 6-5 victory and leaving a crowd of 16,944 stunned and silent.

Welcome back to New York, Jim.

Now go home.

“I don’t know if I’m going to get treated as well the next time I’m here,” said Leyritz, who had four hits Tuesday night after hitting a two-run homer in Monday night’s victory over New York. “It would be fun to do this against any team, but doing it here makes it that much nicer.”

Jack Howell, hitting for Craig Grebeck, singled to left-center with one out to start the game-winning rally, and Dave Hollins’ broken-bat single to center moved pinch-runner Luis Alicea to third.

Rivera struck out Tim Salmon looking, setting the stage for Leyritz, whose game-tying, eighth-inning, three-run homer in Game 4 turned the 1996 World Series around, and whose 15th-inning homer beat Seattle in Game 2 of the 1995 Division Series.

Leyritz lined an 0-1 Rivera slider all the way to the wall in left-center, easily scoring Alicea and Hollins for a 6-5 lead. Mike James, with the help of Hollins’ fine defensive play on Cecil Fielder’s slow roller, slammed the door in the bottom of the ninth for the Angels’ first save of the season.

Shigetoshi Hasegawa, who retired the side in order in the eighth, got his first major league victory, but it was Leyritz, whose three homers this season have come against the Yankees, who hogged the spotlight.

“That’s why Bill [Bavasi, Angel general manager] got him--he loves the stage,” Angel Manager Terry Collins said. “One of the things he’s shown the past few years is when you ask him to come through in clutch situations, he gets it done.”

Added Hollins: “He’s a red-light guy. He gets up for the big games, the big situations. He reminds me of [Philadelphia outfielder] Lenny Dykstra. Any time there was a big game, he’d get the big hits . . . he is the king.”

Rivera, who went 8-3 with a 2.09 earned-run average as the Yankee set-up man in 1996, used to be the late-night king of the hill, but the right-hander has had problems replacing John Wetteland as the Yankee closer.

He already has three blown saves, two of them against the Angels, and the Yankees have now lost more games (three) when leading after eight innings than they did in the entire 1996 season, when they were 79-2 when leading going into the ninth.

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Trailing, 4-3, after four innings, the Angels squandered two opportunities to tie the game, once when Garret Anderson grounded into an inning-ending double play with two on in the sixth and once when Salmon struck out with two on to end the seventh.

Tino Martinez homered off Angel reliever Pep Harris for a 5-3 lead in the seventh, but the Angels came back with a run in the top of the eighth, as Leyritz singled, took second on Mike Stanton’s wild pitch and came home on Darin Erstad’s third hit, an RBI single to center.

“One thing about this team is they’ve always managed to hang in there night after night, knowing someone could get a big hit,” Collins said. “They keep getting guys on base.”

So did the Yankees off Angel starter Chuck Finley, who in his 1997 debut was roughed up for four earned runs in two-plus innings, two more runs than the Yankees scored off Finley in 31 1/3 innings last season.

“I don’t even know what I was doing out there,” Finley said. “I guess I was too pumped up, rushing things. I never got comfortable. I should have dialed it back a few notches. They had plenty of chances to kill me.”