Brett Gardner, Yankees elder statesman, leads comeback at the plate and in the field

NEW YORK — A raucous Yankee Stadium was very quickly quieted in the AL Wild Card Game on Tuesday night. The Minnesota Twins hammered New York Yankees ace Luis Severino for three runs, including two home runs, in the first inning. Severino recorded one out in the game. He was historically bad.

Minnesota’s early 3-0 lead lasted a half-inning. Not even. The Yankees answered with three runs in the bottom of the first on a Didi Gregorius three-run home run. That rally was set up by leadoff man Brett Gardner, who worked a six pitch walk against Ervin Santana to put the offensive wheels in motion.

“Leading off the bottom of the first, I don’t have much time to talk. Just keep up the enthusiasm (in the dugout), stay optimistic,” said Gardner following the Wild Card Game. “There’s a lot of game left, we’ve got some guys in the lineup that do a really good job getting on base and seeing a lot of pitches and driving up Santana’s pitch count. Things worked out for us.”

In the second inning, Gardner gave the Yankees a 4-3 lead with a solo home run into the right field second deck, and after the ball left his bat, he stared down Santana for buzzing him up and in with the previous pitch. Gardner is typically an old school put-your-head-down-and-run player. He was mad and he let Santana know it.

“I was pretty excited to just be able to jump back in the lead there in the second inning,” added Gardner. “I know it’s early in the game, but any time we can give our bullpen the lead, we feel good about our chances. Those guys did a great job.”

Two innings after his go-ahead home run, Gardner helped create two insurance runs with a one-out single the other way against hard-throwing Jose Berrios. That set up Aaron Judge for a two-run home run and a 7-4 Yankees lead. All told, Gardner went 2 for 4 with a walk and a home run in the Wild Card Game, and scored three of his team’s eight runs.

There are two dimensions to Gardner’s game, however. He is also a shutdown defensive left fielder likely to win his second straight Gold Glove this season. His defense became a factor in the sixth inning, when Joe Mauer lifted a long fly ball into the left field corner with two on and two outs. The Yankees were still up 7-4 at the time, so Mauer was representing the tying run. Gardner ran the ball down in a full sprint a few steps in front of the wall.

“I was pretty confident I was going to catch the ball. I was pretty confident that I would get to hope. I was just hoping I didn’t run out of room,” said Gardner.

For obvious reasons, the bullpen is the story of the Wild Card Game for the Yankees. Those guys were phenomenal. Gregorius hitting the game-tying home run and Judge hitting the big two-run home run were the highlights offensively. Those were the swings that helped the Yankees get back into the game and eventually win it.

Both home runs were set up by Gardner, the leadoff man and the longest-tenured Yankee, and the team’s unofficial captain. He’s a leader in the clubhouse, a mentor for the young players, and also the class clown. When a prank is being pulled, Gardner is usually involved. He’s not Derek Jeter or Thurman Munson in terms of star power, but he is a leader, and he’s an integral part of the Yankees. On Tuesday night, he was in the middle of everything, both offensively and defensively.

“He’s a spark plug, and he’s a leader in that clubhouse,” said manager Joe Girardi following the Wild Card Game. “The one thing that we’ve seen always in Gardy is fight in him. He’s got a lot of fight. And I thought that’s what our club showed tonight … Gardy is a big leader in that, and he takes every at-bat like it’s his last at-bat and is going to fight you tooth and nail, and he just kind of sets the tone.”

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Mark Kelly, Gabby Giffords on gun violence: Thoughts and prayers are "not enough"

Former Arizona Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, a Democrat, and a shooting victim herself, and her husband Mark Kelly had strong words for lawmakers after the deadly mass shooting in Las Vegas, urging elected officials to do more than offer their “thoughts and prayers” to victims of gun violence.

“All we’re hearing is thoughts and prayers. Thoughts and prayers are important,” said Kelly said but added that they fell short. “They are not enough. Your thoughts and prayers aren’t going to stop the next shooting.”

The former astronaut charged that Congress has done “absolutely nothing” to stop further acts of gun violence and instead is working to craft legislation to “weaken our gun laws.”

“Imagine how much worse this shooting could have been if the gunman had a silencer,” he suggested.

He added that gun violence in America is now an “epidemic that needs to be cured.”

“Days like this remind us how quickly things can change. We’re angry, but we also have a choice,” he said. “We can offer thoughts and prayers and move on through life, numb to these losses,” said Kelly.

 ”Or we could choose courage. We can decide this problem is worth our greatest efforts and reject the idea this is inevitable,” he added. 

Kelly suggested that Congress must now work to pass “good legislation” that keeps deadly weapons out of the hands of would-be killers, and directed his remarks to the White House. 

“We need a president that recognizes we have a gun violence problem and will work toward solutions,” he said. “Americans need more than our president’s payers. We need his plans.” 

The two also called on Congress to establish a special commission to work together in a bipartisan fashion “toward solutions that will save lives.”

“The nation’s counting on you,” Giffords declared, with a fist extended toward the Capitol. 

Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi echoed those calls on Monday, urging House Speaker Paul Ryan to form a Select Committee on Gun Violence “to study and report back common sense legislation to help end this crisis.”

“The bipartisan committee would make recommendations to prevent unspeakable tragedies such as the mass shooting in Las Vegas and to restore confidence in the safety of our communities,” said Pelosi in a statement on Monday. 

In a statement released before the event, Giffords said, “I know this feeling of heartbreak and horror too well. The massacre in Las Vegas is a grave tragedy for our nation. This must stop – we must stop this.”

She added that she was praying for her former colleagues and elected leaders to “find the courage it will take to make progress on the challenging issue of gun violence.”

Giffords nearly died after being shot in the head on January 8, 2011 during a public event in the parking lot of a Safeway outside of Tucson. In the wake of that incident, she and her husband founded “Americans for Responsible Solutions,” a group dedicated to reforming gun laws and reducing violence.

She has since spoken out on previous acts of gun violence, most recently, the June shooting at an Alexandria, Virginia baseball field that severely injured Majority Whip Steve Scalise, who returned to the Capitol for the first time since the shooting, in an emotional moment on the Hill last week. 

Giffords called that incident “an attack on all who serve and on all who participate in our democracy.”

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