NEW YORK -- Working out of a bases-loaded jam with only one run scoring in the sixth inning deposited a flash of fire in Andy Pettitte's eyes, his firm glare telling the Yankees' bench to stand clear.
Unfortunately for Pettitte, Carlos Pena didn't obey. The first baseman slugged a game-changing three-run homer and the Devil Rays blasted out an 8-2 victory over the Yankees, snapping Pettitte's six-start winning streak.
For Pettitte, the Pena home run came on his 119th and final pitch of the afternoon. Though Yankees manager Joe Torre later admitted that the team had tried to grind toward a better outcome by having Pettitte start the new inning with 103 pitches, the left-hander had no regrets for taking on the seventh inning.
"They sent me back out there with a lot of pitches, and I wanted to be back out there on the mound," Pettitte said. "If you don't make a pitch late in the game after a guy has seen you four times already, if you accidentally hang something, they hurt you."
The damaging blow came on a lazy curveball to the biggest hitter in Tampa Bay's lineup, Pena, a Yankees Triple-A farmhand last season who tied a Devil Rays club record when his 34th homer landed in the right-field seats.
"Andy didn't do anything wrong," Torre said. "I may have pushed the envelope with him in that last inning, but as far as the way he battled it over six innings, it was another effective start for him. He was hell-bent on going out there for the seventh, and we weren't going to try to talk him out of it, that's for sure."
Pettitte (12-8) had won his last six starts and 12 consecutive decisions against Tampa Bay. He lasted 6 1/3 innings, allowing five runs and 11 hits while walking two and striking out seven.
Dioner Navarro's third-inning home run off Pettitte boosted Tampa Bay to a 1-0 lead, the Rays catcher's seventh of the season. Pettitte experienced more control troubles in the sixth, leading to the second Tampa Bay run. He issued a walk to Carl Crawford, who moved to second on an errant pickoff throw, then stole third as Pena worked the count toward a base on balls. B.J. Upton brought home the run with a sacrifice fly to right.
The Rays loaded the bases on hits to Delmon Young and Brendan Harris, but Pettitte came back to strike out Jonny Gomes and induced Josh Wilson to hit into a fielder's choice.
The Devil Rays put the game out of reach by blasting Edwar Ramirez for two homers in the eighth: deep drives by Wilson, his second home run, and Akinori Iwamura, his sixth, a two-run shot.
But long before that, the Yankees were victims of sleepy offense on what Pettitte termed a "lethargic" afternoon at the Stadium -- a sunny Sunday afternoon with crisp autumn air, but little noise coming from a sellout crowd of 53,957.
"You want to get the game going," Pettitte said. "It felt like we couldn't get the crowd into it or anything. It felt like it was a little lethargic day out there. That's the frustrating part, more than anything. You're out there battling your tail off."
Then again, with Jason Hammel throwing an effectively wild performance, maybe the fans just didn't have all that much to clap their hands about.
"[Pettitte] pitched well. He gave us an opportunity to win," said Derek Jeter, who went 0-for-5 with three strikeouts and may be in the market for another day of rest. "He threw the ball pretty well, and we had a couple of opportunities. We didn't get the job done."
The loudest point of the afternoon may have been the yelp let out by Andy Phillips in the fifth inning, drilled by a Hammel fastball on the right wrist. Examined at first base after shaking his arm vigorously down the basepath, Phillips took out some aggression on the catcher Navarro, crashing into the backstop as he slid home on Melky Cabrera's run-scoring double to right.
After scoring, Phillips walked straight down the clubhouse runway and off to an area hospital, on his way for a precautionary MRI and CT scan. He may as well have taken the Yankees' offense with him; except for Bobby Abreu's run-scoring triple off Grant Balfour in the seventh, New York managed little, stranding two in the sixth, two in the eighth and going down quietly in the ninth against Gary Glover.
"We threatened," said left fielder Johnny Damon, who contributed an outfield assist to save a run in the fifth. "Unfortunately, we couldn't get that extra run in -- something that we've been pretty good at all year. We spoiled a good pitching outing by Pettitte again. We should have at least been able to push a few more runs across to make his job easier."
Hammel (2-4) scattered five hits in five-plus innings, walking none and striking out seven for the victory for the Devil Rays, who took two of three in the weekend series. The series was a bit of a dip in the slate for a Yankees club that cannot afford more of the same, particularly with the Wild Card-contending Mariners rolling to town Monday looking to snap their own malaise.
"I don't think it matters who we play. Every team is going to play us tough," Jeter said. "We have to execute to give us an opportunity to win. We've been playing pretty good -- [Tampa Bay] beat us two out of three here, but we come right back."
