Yankees Go Homer

Yankee Stadium registered about a 5.4 on the Richter Scale on Wednesday night. The House that Ruth Built and that Jeter, Martinez, Williams, et al have so lovingly maintained quivered with excitement, as the New York Yankees staged one of their most dramatic comebacks in recent playoff history and added true meaning to the term “Fall Classic.”

Down to their last out and trailing by two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning, Tino Martinez smashed a game-tying two-run home run to center field off Arizona closer Byung-Hyun Kim, sending a crowd of 55,853 into delirium.

An inning later, as midnight passed and October turned to November, Derek Jeter lined a two-out, opposite-field home run over the right-field wall off Kim to give the Yankees a scintillating 4-3 victory over the Arizona Diamondbacks in Game 4 of the World Series, evening the best-of-seven series at two games apiece.

After circling the bases, Jeter leaped onto home plate and into the arms of his Yankee teammates, who greeted baseball’s first Mr. November in an emotional group hug as Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” blared over the public-address system.

“This one has got to be ranked at the top,” Manager Joe Torre said after the three-time defending-champion Yankees became only the third team--the 1911 New York Giants and the 1929 Philadelphia A’s were the others--to erase a two-run, ninth-inning deficit in a World Series game.

“You know, surprising things happen, and yet, when you really think about it, it doesn’t surprise you because this ballclub never quits. For six years. I’ve watched these guys just play hard right to the last out. It was an unbelievable game, it really was.”

Kim, the submarine-style-throwing right-hander, was deep into his third inning when Jeter stroked a full-count pitch a few feet over the wall for his ninth career playoff home run and only his second hit of the Series. It was Kim’s 62nd pitch.

“I had no idea it was going out,” Jeter said. “Once it went out, it was a real special feeling, because I’ve never hit a walk-off home run. I think I broke my foot jumping on home plate.”

He also broke Diamondback pitcher Curt Schilling’s heart. Schilling, starting on three days’ rest, was masterful over seven innings, limiting the Yankees to one run on three hits and striking out nine before handing the ball over to Kim, who struck out the side in the eighth to preserve a 3-1 lead.

But with one out in the ninth, Paul O’Neill singled. Kim struck out Bernie Williams for the second out, but Martinez plastered Kim’s first pitch, sending it over the wall in center for a tying home run.

The struggling first baseman admitted he went to the plate looking for a home run and actually hit it.

“I just thought the first two strikes, just try to get something up in the zone, something I could turn on and just take a good, strong hack at it,” said Martinez, who watched Kim strike out the side in the eighth inning on a clubhouse television. “I just waited back and saw the ball very well. It was right down the middle. I took a good swing and made great contact.”

The Diamondbacks had snapped a 1-1 tie with a two-run rally in the eighth inning. Luis Gonzalez singled with one out, then designated hitter Erubiel Durazo drove a ball to deep center, just out of the reach of Williams. Gonzalez stumbled around second as the ball hit the wall, and Williams threw to strong-armed second baseman Alfonso Soriano.

Gonzalez headed for home, and Soriano appeared to have a good shot at him, but he hooked his throw about 30 feet up the first-base line, almost into the Yankee dugout, and Gonzalez scored for a 2-1 lead.

Durazo took third on the throw and was replaced by pinch-runner Midre Cummings, who broke for home on Matt Williams’ grounder to shortstop and beat Jeter’s throw to the plate for a 3-1 lead.

Just a half-inning earlier, it appeared the Yankees would stage one of their patented late-inning October rallies when Williams singled and Martinez walked to open the seventh inning of a 1-1 game.

With the crowd on its feet and the noise deafening, Jorge Posada bounced into a 4-6-3 double play. Schilling then reared back and, on his 88th pitch of the evening, fired a 97-mph fastball by David Justice for strike three, Justice’s eighth strikeout in eight Series at-bats.

The Yankees were down. A half-inning later, they were down by three runs and close to being down, 3-1, in the series. Then, an inning later, they were sky-high, as Martinez’s homer tied the game. An inning after that, and three minutes after Torre’s contract expired at midnight, they were as high as they’ve been at any time during the past five years, in which they won four championships.

“That’s probably the thing that changes the quickest once you get to the World Series, the momentum,” said Yankee reliever Mike Stanton, who got Tony Womack to bounce into a 4-6-3 double play with two on to snuff out a seventh-inning rally. “Emotions can go from high to low, from low to high, in a matter of ... how long did it take [Jeter’s homer] to get out of the park, about three seconds?”

The Yankees and Diamondbacks exchanged early home runs, as Shane Spencer sliced a solo shot around the right-field pole in the third to give New York a 1-0 lead and Mark Grace ripped a solo shot into the upper deck in right in the fourth to pull Arizona even, 1-1. Then came the late dramatics.

“This is what the fans want to see, this is what baseball is all about,” Arizona right fielder Reggie Sanders said. “Just as we’re a resilient team, they’re obviously a resilient team too. Yeah, I was surprised [by Martinez’s home run] but that’s what they do. It’s going to be a great series.”

It already is.