NEW YORK - Ichiro Suzuki homered off Tanner Scheppers with two outs in the ninth inning, lifting the New York Yankees to a 4-3 victory over the Texas Rangers on Tuesday night.
Suzuki’s drive to right-center was the Yankees’ fourth home run of the game, three coming off Japanese ace Yu Darvish, and it helped New York improve to 4-3 on a home stand that ends after two more games against the Rangers.
Travis Hafner, Brett Gardner and Jayson Nix each homered off Darvish, who hasn’t won in seven starts. Leonys Martin connected twice off Yankees starter Hiroki Kuroda.
Mariano Rivera (1-1) worked a scoreless ninth for New York, which ended the Rangers’ five-game winning streak.
Scheppers (5-1) pitched a perfect eighth before giving up Suzuki’s game-winning blast.
The anticipated match up between Darvish and Kuroda, Japanese aces with ERAs under 3.00, fizzled on a hot and sticky night when a four-inning stretch produced five home runs.
The 11th major-league match up between starters from Japan got off to a sharp start. Even when the Yankees loaded the bases in the first on three consecutive singles that just cleared the gloves of leaping infielders, Darvish easily worked out of the jam with a strikeout and a grounder.
But Martin started the home run barrage with a shot that landed a couple of rows back in the short right-field porch.
After the Rangers went up 2-0 on an unearned run in the fourth aided by third baseman David Adams’ throwing error, Hafner led off the bottom half with a home run into the New York bullpen. Martin then started the fifth with a shot that landed several sections to the left of his first home run for his fifth of the year.
Not to be outdone, Gardner led off the Yankees’ half with a line drive deep into the seats in right field to pull New York to 3-2.
ORIOLES 6, INDIANS 3 Chris Davis and Alexi Casilla homered in a five-run seventh inning, and host Baltimore beat Cleveland.
RAYS 5, BLUE JAYS 1 Matt Moore overcame control problems to allow one run over six innings as Tampa Bay Rays beat visiting Toronto.
ANGELS 14, TIGERS 8 Albert Pujols doubled, singled, scored a run and drove one in as Los Angeles routed host Detroit again.
NATIONAL LEAGUE
NATIONALS 7, DIAMONDBACKS 5 Adam LaRoche hit a three-run home run and Gio Gonzalez won for the first time since May 5 as Washington defeated visiting Arizona.
BREWERS 9, CUBS 3 Rickie Weeks hit two home runs and drove in four runs as host Milwaukee beat Chicago. Jonathan Lucroy added a two-run double and Juan Francisco also hit a home run for Milwaukee.
INTERLEAGUE
MARLINS 4, TWINS 2 Marcell Ozuna drove in two runs and Derek Dietrich homered to help Miami to a victory against visiting Minnesota.
RED SOX 11, ROCKIES 4 Dustin Pedroia drove in four runs and had three of host Boston’s season-high 20 hits, and Ryan Dempster took advantage of an early cushion that kept getting bigger in a victory over Colorado.
WHITE SOX 5, METS 4 Alexei Ramirez singled in the winning run in the bottom of the ninth after Chicago committed a costly error in the top half of the inning, and Chris Sale struck out 13 in eight innings to lead his team over visiting New York.
BRAVES 4, ROYALS 3 Kris Medlen out pitched Ervin Santana over seven innings, Jason Heyward hit a go-ahead home run, and Atlanta hung on for a victory in its first visit to Kansas City.
CARDINALS 13, ASTROS 5 Allen Craig homered and had a season-high four hits with three RBI, and Carlos Beltran and David Freese both added a home run as St. Louis rolled past host Houston.
Tuesday’s games
NATIONAL LEAGUE Washington 7, Arizona 5 Milwaukee 9, Chicago Cubs 3 Philadelphia at San Diego, (n) San Francisco at LA Dodgers, (n)
AMERICAN LEAGUE NY Yankees 4, Texas 3 LA Angels 14, Detroit 8 Baltimore 6, Cleveland 3 Tampa Bay 5, Toronto 1
INTERLEAGUE Boston 11, Colorado 4 Miami 4, Minnesota 2 Atlanta 4, Kansas City 3 Chicago White Sox 5, NY Mets 4 St. Louis 13, Houston 5 Cincinnati at Oakland, (n) Pittsburgh at Seattle, (n)
Sports, Pages 22 on 06/26/2013