A-Rod's walkoff HR christens new Yankee Stadium

NEW YORK – The hulking empty shell across the street is no longer the sole repository of Yankee hagiography.

The doors of the new Yankee Stadium have been open for four months now, but the christening came Friday night, with a game between those ancient rivals, the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox, that will be etched in memory no less than the many epic contests that have preceded it.

Fourteen innings of scoreless baseball, in a game that began bathed in the late-afternoon sunlight of a humidity-free August day and finished bathed by the light of a fluorescent full moon.

One swing to shatter the night, Alex Rodriguez's(notes) two-run home run into a Red Sox bullpen emptied of its last man: a 23-year-old kid named Junichi Tazawa(notes) who a year ago was pitching in a Japanese industrial league, had just hours earlier put on a Red Sox uniform for the first time, and at 12:42 a.m. walked head down off the mound, a 2-0 loser in his major league debut.

"It was a big game at the beginning,'' Rodriguez said after ending the longest scoreless duel ever played between the teams, "and it just got bigger and bigger.''

The Red Sox, who had just four hits the entire night, all singles, have now lost four in a row, two straight to the Yankees. They now trail the first-place Bombers by 4½ games, a swing of 7½ games in just three weeks since the All-Star break. Their lead in the wild-card race is down to one over Texas, 2½ games over the Rays.

And CC Sabathia(notes) awaits Saturday afternoon.

A.J. Burnett(notes) was the Yankees' starter Friday night, and gave up a single to the Red Sox leadoff hitter, Jacoby Ellsbury(notes), to open the game.

Boston's next hit would not come until there were two outs in the ninth, when David Ortiz(notes) singled off Mariano Rivera(notes), who typically closes Yankee games but on this night would be just the third of six Yankee pitchers.

Burnett left with two outs in the eighth after walking Ellsbury, and upon handing the ball to manager Joe Girardi, was staggered by the wave of sound that washed over him as he departed from the mound.

"I had goose bumps all the way to the dugout,'' Burnett said. "It was awesome. It was an environment that I can't describe. The whole place was still packed in the 15th. To come off the field and get that kind of an ovation like that is one thing. I've never experienced anything like that before. It was amazing.''

Boston would advance only one baserunner as far as third base the entire night. That was Ellsbury, who after his leadoff single stole second and, following a four-pitch walk to Dustin Pedroia(notes), advanced when Victor Martinez(notes) rolled into a double play.

The Yankees had a couple of chances against Boston ace Josh Beckett(notes), but no more. Robinson Cano(notes) was stranded at third after his leadoff double in the third. Third baseman Kevin Youkilis(notes) charged Derek Jeter's(notes) slow roller with the bases loaded and threw him out with an off-balance throw to end the fifth.

With Red Sox rookie Daniel Bard(notes) on the mound, the Yankees threatened to end the game in regulation when an infield hit, stolen base, walk and balk put runners on second and third with two out in the ninth inning, but Bard, hitting 98 mph on the radar gun, struck out Jorge Posada(notes) to send the game into extra innings.

"It seemed to be,'' Jeter said, "a game of missed opportunities.''

Jeter was presented another in the 10th, but went down swinging against Boston closer Jonathan Papelbon(notes) with a runner on third to end the inning. Papelbon was the fifth Red Sox pitcher of the night. There would be two more – Manny Delcarmen(notes) and Takashi Saito(notes) – before the 14th, when Tazawa, just promoted from Triple-A Pawtucket, entered the game.

"I was honored,'' he said, "to be in such an important situation.''

The first batter Tazawa faced was Hideki Matsui(notes), whose poster had hung on Tazawa's wall when he was a child. Matsui crushed a pitch, but hit it on a line directly to center-fielder Ellsbury. Posada followed with another bullet, a line-drive single to right, and when Cano blooped a single to center, the great throng sprung to life, sensing an end in sight.

So did the next hitter, Eric Hinske(notes), who lashed a ball that appeared headed toward the right-field corner. "I had no chance,'' Red Sox right-fielder J.D. Drew(notes) said.

And yet, he somehow did, stretching his gloved left hand as far as humanly possible while in a full sprint and making a stab of a ball that was behind him when he caught it. Longtime Red Sox watchers were reminded of the game-saving catch that another Red Sox right-fielder, Dwight Evans, had made in extra innings in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series against Cincinnati.

Hinske, who had played for the Red Sox in 2007, when they won their second World Series in four seasons, and last season played for the Rays on their way to the World Series, looked out to right field in disbelief.

"That's when I thought this game would never end,'' Jeter said. "I don't know how he made that play. It was a great catch.''

Moments later, several Yankees, including Sabathia, had begun to vault the dugout railing in the mistaken belief that another line drive, this one struck by Melky Cabrera(notes), had decided this affair. Instead, the ball landed just inches foul.

"At that point,'' said Yankees reliever Brian Bruney(notes), who pitched the 13th and 14th, "you could only laugh.''

Cabrera went down swinging on a full-count breaking ball from Tazawa, and the scoreless tie had now lasted longer than the Sox-Yankee game in 1969, won by Mike Andrew's double off Stan Bahnsen in the 14th inning of a 1-0 Red Sox win.

"Everyone in the park knew,'' Bruney said, "that this one was going to come down to one swing.''

Jeter opened the 15th by flaring a single to center. But Johnny Damon(notes) popped up his bunt attempt and Mark Teixeira(notes) struck out on a pitch over his head. That brought up Rodriguez, who had not hit a home run in 72 at-bats, the longest he had gone between home runs in a single season.

In six previous at-bats Friday, he had just an infield hit. Tazawa started him with three fastballs, two of them that were out of the strike zone. Tazawa then threw him a curve, and Rodriguez did not miss it. He raised fists to the sky as the ball cleared the wall, then flipped his helmet and burrowed into the mass of teammates awaiting him at home plate.

In that moment, A-Rod brought to life a lyric from songwriter Paul Simon, who like so many of his fellow Yankee fans stayed to the triumphant end.

"It was late in the evening,'' the song goes, "and I blew that room away.''