Yeah. It’s the first time a Major League team has accomplished that feat.

Here are last night’s dingers:

First up, Gleyber Torres’ first.

Next, Neil Walker’s first as a Yankee.

Aaron Judge joined the party.

Torres’ second dinger of the night.

And finally, Aaron Hicks.

It was a slugfest and the Yankees ended up on top.

Photo credit Kevin Jairaj / USA Today Sports

And for seven innings, it looked like the Orioles could pull it off. They scored five runs off Yankees’ starter David Cone in six innings, and Orioles’ starter Doug Johns held the Yankees to a run in five innings.

By the time the bottom of the eighth inning started, the Orioles were holding on to a 5-3 lead. Orioles reliever Sidney Ponson, who replaced Johns in the sixth and who gave up two runs in the bottom of the seventh, got Scott Brosius to fly out to right on a 2-1 pitch for the first out. He then walked Jorge Posada who was pinch-hitting for Joe Girardi and Chuck Knoblauch to put runners on first and second. Orioles manager Ray Miller summoned right-hander Alan Mills from the bullpen to replace Ponson and pitch to Derek Jeter. Mills got Jeter to fly out to shallow right on the first pitch. With two on and two out, Miller once again strode out to the pitcher’s mound to take the ball from Mills, and lefty Norm Charlton came into the game to face Paul O’Neill. O’Neill hit a 1-0 pitch into the hole between shortstop and third base which scored Posada to make the score 5-4. Knoblauch advanced to third. Miller, who would have been in deep trouble if the mound visit limit was in effect in 1998, called upon righty Armando Benitez to end the inning. Instead, Benitez surrendered a three-run home run to Bernie Williams which gave the Yankees a 7-5 lead.

While the stadium was still rocking and the fans were still celebrating, Tino Martinez stepped into the box to face Benitez and was immediately greeted with a fastball to the back, right between the 2 and the 4. Benitez had a history with the Yankees already. More specifically, he had plunked Martinez once before, so when it happened again, the Yankees were not going to brush it off. Home plate umpire Drew Coble threw Benitez out of the game and then Benitez did the tough guy thing, he motioned for the Yankees to come and get him, and well, they did, and all hell broke loose.

Some highlights from the video include: (0:34) the Yankees bullpen; specifically, Graeme Lloyd goes after Benitez, (1:56) Jeff Nelson tries to get at Benitez and at (2:03) Darryl Strawberry disappears from the shot, but you see him as he’s about to nail Benitez (The replay is at 6:01). At (3:05) Joe Torre is trying to calm down Strawberry. Strawberry ended up being punched by Alan Mills.

It was ugly all around, and it didn’t have to happen. Benitez didn’t need to hit Martinez in the back. It wasn’t Tino Martinez’s fault that your team used up its bullpen in a single inning and lost the lead. But the umpires were also at fault because they didn’t warn the benches after Benitez’s obvious message to the Yankees.

After the umps restored order, nearly 10 minutes later, reliever Bobby Munoz was on the mound for the Os and Tim Raines was at the plate for the Yankees. Munoz threw his first pitch and Raines deposited it into the right-field seats to give the Yankees a 9-5 lead that they wouldn’t relinquish.

Two days later, American League President Gene Budig handed out suspensions to five players; three Yankees and two Orioles. Darryl Strawberry (3 games), Graeme Lloyd (3 games), and Alan Mills (3 games) and Jeff Nelson (2 games). Armando Benitez received the largest suspension: eight games.

Gene Budig released a statement explaining his decision and said this about Benitez hitting Martinez: “The severity of the discipline reflects the gravity of the offenses. Mr. Benitez not only intentionally threw at Martinez, but the location of the pitch was extremely dangerous and could have seriously injured the player.”

He added: “This was a highly unfortunate and highly dangerous on-field situation. The events demand swift and stern action. A player’s safety is of utmost importance.”

Martinez didn’t break anything; he just had a large welt in the middle of his back for a while. As for the Yankees and Orioles, you know how 1998 ended up; the Yankees barely lost any games and won their 24th championship while the Orioles finished fourth in the American League East division with a 79-83 record.

After Cashman re-signed, with the promise of more autonomy in his job, the Yankees made a few moves. They signed Bernie Williams and Ramiro Mendoza to contracts and, much to Cashman’s relief, free agent Johnny Damon came over from the “idiot” Red Sox, signing a four year, $52 million contract. Cashman was telling anyone who would listen that he would be perfectly content with second-year centerfielder Melky Cabrera starting in 2006, but was secretly holding out hope that the Yankees could land Damon, and they did.

The majority of the moves that constructed the Yankees’ 2006 roster were made either during the 2004-05 offseason by the aforementioned Tampa Faction, or during the 2005 season via trades.

The 2006 Yankees were expected to be another overpaid, playoff bound, but not quite championship caliber team because of some deficits in their roster, and that’s exactly what they turned out to be. In fact, the 2006 BP annual’s prediction for the Yankees was, “Steinbrenner’s price-to-performance ratio keeps getting worse, but the galaxy of stars will be in the playoffs again.”

Heading into the 2006 season, the Yankees’ pythagorean record was predicted to be 95-67, which is the record they actually finished with the previous season. There was no question that they could hit, and their pitching staff was strong. The real question about the 2006 Yankees revolved around age. Their batters’ average age was 31.5 (oldest in the AL) and their pitching staff’s average age was 32.9 (also the oldest in the AL). Would it hold up to the rigors of a long season?

Here’s what the lineup looked like on Opening Day in Oakland on April 3:

As you can see, PECOTA was expecting another big year from 2005 MVP Alex Rodriguez and outfielder Gary Sheffield. It also predicted that second-year player Robinson Cano would have a nice season of work manning second base.

As for the pitchers on staff, PECOTA wasn’t kind to Shawn Chacon and a predicted 8-9 record with 4.84 ERA. Amazingly, his year was even worse than that and he finished the year on a different team. The starters were Mike Mussina (Projected 2006 numbers: 11-9, 4.08 ERA), Jaret Wright (Proj: 5-6, 5.07 ERA), Chien-Ming Wang (Proj: 9-9, 4.55 ERA) and Randy Johnson (Proj: 16-8, 3.19 ERA).

Johnson started the season opener for the Yankees in Oakland and Andy Phillips, Bubba Crosby and Kelly Stinnett (remember him?) were defensive replacements for Giambi, Sheffield and Posada. Johnson pitched seven innings and Tanyon Sturtze and Ron Villone relieved him to preserve a 15-2 drubbing of the A’s. Rodriguez and Matsui hit home runs, and Matsui was a perfect 4 for 4 at the plate.

Then, they lost four in a row and fans began to panic. Thankfully, the Yankees salvaged the last game of a west coast trip and headed into their home opener on April 11 with a 2-4 record.

In the home opener, on April 11, Chien-Ming Wang made a rocky start. He pitched six innings, which is normally fine, but gave up five runs on eight hits with only one strikeout. It’s a good thing his lineup, which was nearly a carbon copy of Opening Day with the exception of a switch at the bottom with Cano moving up to eighth and Williams moving down to the ninth spot, bailed him out. Both Jeter and Giambi had three RBIs and a home run each.

The 2006 squad was a tad streaky, and while a lot of those streaks featured a lot of wins, when they entered play on July 4 they were four games back in the AL East. They were also snakebitten by injuries, losing Sheffield and Matsui for extended periods of time. Both injuries happened within two weeks of each other, both involved the players’ wrists, they involved surgery, and they cast a pall on the season. Matsui broke his wrist while attempting a diving play during a game against the Red Sox at Yankee Stadium. Sheffield initially injured his wrist during an on-field collision, and after a trip to the DL and a brief return to the lineup, elected to have surgery. Giambi, who carried the team for the majority of the season, was also felled by a wrist injury in late August in Seattle and it affected the rest of his season.

In June, the Yankees drafted two familiar names: Ian Kennedy (1st round, 26th pick) and Joba Chamberlain (1st round, 41st pick) and in July, they traded for Bobby Abreu and Cory Lidle while sending minor leaguers C.J. Henry and Jesus Sanchez along with Carlos Monasterios and Matt Smith to the Philadelphia Phillies. They also traded the struggling Chacon to the Pittsburgh Pirates for Craig Wilson.

The Yankees signed free agent Sidney Ponson in mid-July, but that experiment ended a mere 40 days later when he was released with one loss, no wins and  a 10.47 ERA in 16.1 innings.

Throughout the season the middle infielders, Jeter and Cano, were consistent at the plate and had a bit of a batting average battle. Jeter ultimately won, .343 to .342, and finished second in American League MVP voting to Justin Morneau of the Minnesota Twins.

Also having himself a nice season was another sophomore in Chien-Ming Wang. He emerged as the ace of the pitching staff, winning 19 games and finishing a distance second in Cy Young voting behind Minnesota’s Johan Santana.

During a now-infamous weekend in August, the Yankees, thanks to a couple of rainouts earlier in the season, were scheduled to play a five-game series against the Red Sox at Fenway Park. It was to be a doubleheader day on Friday, followed by single games on Saturday, Sunday night and Monday afternoon. The Yankees had dropped two of three at home to Baltimore with the finale in that series on Thursday August 17 a 12-2 drubbing which shrunk the Yankees’ division lead to just 1 1/2 games. The series in Boston would be a big one because it could either help the Yankees or really hurt them.

Around 4:15 p.m. on Monday, Aug. 21, the Yankees walked off the field at Fenway victorious after a 2-1 victory. They had just swept the five-game series and left Boston with a 6 1/2 game lead in the divison.

On Saturday, Aug. 26, the Yankees’ division lead was 5 1/2 games after a loss to the Angels. That’s the lowest it would be for the rest of the season. Their division lead only grew during September and they finished the regular season 10 games ahead of the second place Toronto Blue Jays. It was their ninth straight division win.

Not bad for a bunch of old, injured guys. Of course September did not come and go without without controversy. Sports Illustrated published a story written by Tom Verducci in which Giambi and manager Joe Torre let everyone know that they gave Alex Rodriguez some tough love during the season. Torre even had a closed door meeting with Rodriguez in Seattle during an August series. Of course, the story blew up and it had a rippling affect that the team carried all the way through the playoffs.

September also saw the return of Matsui and Sheffield to the lineup, but their reentry didn’t go as smoothly as the Yankees had hoped.

The 2006 Division Series matched the Yankees against with the Wild Card Detroit Tigers. It turned out to be an unmitigated disaster for the Yankees who won the first game of the series at home, then watched Joel Zumaya pitch out of his mind in relief during Game 2 and dealt with controversy when manager Joe Torre slotted Alex Rodriguez into the eighth slot of the lineup during Game 4 in Detroit. It wasn’t as if Rodriguez deserved to be batting higher, he was putrid during that series (batting .071/.133/.071), but the idea of 2005’s MVP batting anywhere lower than fifth, even in that high-powered lineup, was unheard of no matter how awful he had been at the plate.

But the contention didn’t last long because the Tigers sent the Yankees home after that controversial game in Comerica Park. It was ugly end to a disappointing season.

Some key players and their end of season numbers:

• Rodriguez: .290/.392/.523 with 35 home runs and 121 RBI
• Giambi: .253/.413/.558 with 37 home runs and 113 RBI
• Jeter: .343/.417/.483 with 14 home runs and 97 RBI
• Cano: .342/.365/.525 with 15 home runs and 78 RBI
• Mussina: 15-7, 3.51 ERA
• Cabrera: .280/.360/.391 with seven home runs and 50 RBI
• Damon: .285/.359/.482 with 24 home runs and 80 RBI
• Johnson: 17-11, 5.00 ERA
• Wang: 19-6, 3.63 ERA
• Wright: 11-7, 4.49 ERA
• Posada: .277/.374/.492 with 23 home runs and 93 RBI

***

The 2006 Yankees, while essentially a letdown because of their early and uninspired playoff exit, still finished with a 97-65 record, scored 930 runs (5.74 a game – 1st in the AL), allowed 767 (4.73 a game – 6th in the AL) and showed everyone that even with major injuries to key players and even with some controversy in the clubhouse, a team is still capable of winning games on the field. They just happened to pick the absolute worst time to have a three-game losing streak.

Lead photo: Benny Sieu / USA Today Sports