Game 2:

Wednesday, October 6, 2004 at Yankee Stadium (I) in Bronx, New York

Team

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

R

H

E

Minnesota

1

2

0

0

0

0

0

2

0

0

0

1

6

12

0

New York

1

0

2

0

1

0

1

0

0

0

0

2

7

9

0

WP: Paul Quantrill (1–0)   LP: Joe Nathan (0–1)

Home runs:
MIN: Torii Hunter (1)
NYY: Derek Jeter (1), Gary Sheffield (1), Alex Rodriguez (1)



@ retrosheet.org

Brad Radke faced Jon Lieber in a must-win game for the Yankees. It was arguably the best game of the series. In the top of the first, Justin Morneau doubled in Torii Hunter to give the Twins a 1–0 lead. In the bottom of the first, Derek Jeter led off the game with a game-tying home run to make it a 1–1 game. In the top of the second, A single by Cuddyer and a sac fly by Henry Blanco made it 3–1 Twins. But Gary Sheffield would tie the game with a two-run homer in the bottom of the third. Alex Rodriguez gave the Yankees the lead in the bottom of the fifth with a solo home run. He would also add in another run by singling home Miguel Cairo to make it 5–3 Yankees in the bottom of the seventh.

A passed-ball, third strike allowed the Twins to tie the game, in the the top of the eighth. Torii Hunter would single to put runners on first and second. Mariano Rivera came in but the Twins were still able to tie the game. A single by Morneau and a ground-rule double by Corey Koskie would be the tying-run scorers. However, the ground-rule double cost the Twins a run and they would never be able to score that run as Jason Kubel and Cristian Guzmán went down.

The game went into extra innings and in the top of the 12th, Torii Hunter hit the go-ahead solo home run. The Twins were on the verge of putting the Yankees down two games to none. But Twins manager Ron Gardenhire made the already questionable move of leaving closer Joe Nathan in for a third inning of work. Nathan got the first out, but then walked Cairo and Jeter on four pitches each. Nathan clearly had nothing left, but was still left in the game to pitch to Alex Rodriguez, who hit a ground-rule double that tied the game. Then, after Sheffield was intentionally walked, Hideki Matsui hit the game-winning sacrifice fly that scored Jeter.