Bronx, N.Y., July 8, 2007 — After a Saturday game Melky Cabrera will be trying to forget his whole career (1-for-6 with five strike outs), he stroked Sunday’s first hit, releasing a charging Yankee offense that was bottled up by Anaheim for 13 long innings the afternoon before. Melky would score a run, something all nine guys in the lineup did Sunday, and the Yanks rode three home runs to a 12-0 laugher.

All three Yankee fence clearers were three-run jobs, and they doubled for two more runs late. The 12 tallies were driven in by four players, one of them Miguel Cairo, who delivered a two-run double after replacing Derek Jeter in the seventh. Hideki Matsui’s three-run first-inning drive reached the right field upper deck in a nonce, Robbie Cano hit the screen on the right field pole in the home fourth for another three, and Alex Rodriguez followed with a drive to the first row in left for a 10-0 lead five batters later. The team scored 14 Friday and 12 today, but could not come up with a big hit and a second run in 13 frames Saturday.

But this was baseball, and aside from the joy of sitting in sultry 92-degree temps under a sizzling sun, with the humidity still manageable, the day had its nervous Yankee-fan moments too, albeit all of them early. Coming off an injury-tainted Spring Training, Chien-Ming Wang has reclaimed his place among the elite young starters in the American League, hitting bats with his two-seam and four-seam fastballs to consistent multi-inning starts and low scores allowed.

But despite coming off a dominant seven-inning, 8-0 blanking of Minnesota Tuesday, Chien-Ming had an “issue” that night, experiencing some finger problems during a top of the fourth during which he walked four Twins batters. It was perplexing that night that Wang seemed to have less trouble controlling the slider and change of pace he has been mixing into his arsenal this year than he did with his bread-and-butter, the low to mid-nineties fastball.

And here he was again Sunday, throwing heat pitch after pitch and missing the zone to start the top of the first. He walked left fielder Reggie Willetts on five pitches and fell behind third baseman Chone Figgins 3-1. Then he got a helping hand from battery mate Jorge Posada, who threw Willetts out stealing after a called strike two on yet another hard sinking pitch. Figgins fouled off the next offering and swung over the one that followed, for a strike out. Wang got shortstop Orlando Cabrera to a 2-2 count, and then he fooled 54,000 people as Cabrera flailed at and missed the hard-throwing righty’s first slider of the day to close the first.

Returning to the mound after the explosive Yankee four-run first, Chien-Ming allowed a four-pitch walk and a single around a fly out and another K, but escaped on a Maicer Izturis line drive right to Alex Rodriguez. It was obvious to any that were watching that lefty reliever Ron Villone was warming in the pen before Chien-Ming reappeared for the second inning, so concern abot his finger was rife. But we needn’t have worried. That Wang notched three swinging strike outs through two was almost as odd as the fact that he had not yet retired an Angel batter on a ground ball, but that was about to change. The next six outs were ground balls, and again four more of the six that followed those. By the time he left up 10-0 with one down in the seventh, he had retired 10 of 19 on ground balls.

Neither Wang, nor Roger Clemens who preceded him, threw as many strikes as one might expect in dominant outings, but Wang was awesome even if he delivered just 13 of 25 first-pitch strikes, and 55 of 87 pitches in the zone on the day. Angels batters swung and missed five times the first two frames leading to the three K’s. In the innings that followed, Chieng-Ming struck no more out and missed just two more swinging bats before he was removed. With Wang and Clemens leading the way, the Yanks look primed for a second-half charge following the All Star break.

But the 2007 season results will remain at their middling level unless the Yanks can come through with consistent offense. They wielded thunderous lumber in beating Minnesota and Anaheim five out of seven in consecutive series, with the bats falling silent only when aces took the mound. It’s no secret that the hitting languished when Johan Santana and John Lackey started against the Yanks, but they pounded Oakland’s Danny Haren a week ago, a performance they’ll need to repeat at least sometimes when they face the other team’s ace.

But they can make things interesting even if they pound all but the League’s most elite starters, and that is the offensive consistency they need to strive for. Today they owned Ervin Santana, who has had success against the Yanks in the past, even though he is struggling in this season. Cabrera’s first-inning single was followed by one-base hits from All Star starters Jeter and Rodriguez, with A-Rod’s soft liner into short center producing the game’s first run. Matsui’s bomb followed and the rout was on.

Rocker Andy Fletcher of rock group Depeche Mode celebrates his 46th birthday July 8. Watching the Yanks tack on two more for the game’s 12-0 final tally in the bottom of the eighth, we couldn’t help thinking of one of Depeche Mode’s first hits:

Just Can’t Get Enough

BTW,TYW

YANKEE BASEBALL!!!