Franklin Gutierrez gives Mariners a spark in 8-4 win over Yankees

NEW YORK — The latest bat to step out of the wilderness for the Mariners tends to sound about as invisible as he'd looked the first two months at the plate.

Not that there was anything overtly wrong with what Franklin Gutierrez did hitting-wise in April and May. But the guy who set the tone on Thursday night with a rocket home run and two additional hits in his team's 8-4 win over the New York Yankees no longer looks like a skinny center fielder hoping for singles.

Instead, it's been Gutierrez stepping up huge for a Mariners team reeling from the offensive loss of Adrian Beltre. But as big as Gutierrez has been, you still need a microphone to hear his monotone, whisper-like voice describe in numbing nonchalance how his three hits helped put the boot to former Cleveland teammate C.C. Sabathia.

"The key today was swinging at good pitches and trying to score some runs early," he said with a shrug. "That's what we did."

Low-key words indeed from a man who silenced 46,142 fans at Yankee Stadium with his second inning solo blast off Sabathia to make it 2-0, then ignited a three-run fourth with a leadoff single to help give Seattle a 6-2 cushion it had to fight to hold on to.

His postgame comments are hardly things of beauty like some of the racing, leaping catches Gutierrez has made in establishing himself as one of the game's premier defenders.

Winning pitcher Miguel Batista, who took over from flu-ridden starter Jason Vargas after four innings and allowed just one walk over two scoreless frames, describes Gutierrez the gloveman as "more of a combination between Vernon Wells and Devon White."

Batista played with Wells in Toronto for two years.

"He's so smooth," Batista said of Gutierrez. "You see him chasing those balls and you never think he's going that far, but he is. We in the bullpen see how shallow he plays and how he still has time to run back and jump over the wall and have a chance to bring the ball back in.

"A guy like [bullpen coach] John Wetteland, who's been around so long, he'll look at him make plays and he'll just turn around to us and say, 'Man, that boy is good.' "

Batista needed Gutierrez's glove on a night he chose to let the Yankees put the ball in play. And the Mariners, now 3-3 on this road trip after salvaging the series finale, needed the Gutierrez bat that's hit safely in 12 of 13 games with a .415 average, four homers and eight runs batted in.

They'd seen Jose Lopez and Mike Sweeney go hitless in front of the No. 5-hitting Gutierrez, while a tired-looking Russell Branyan had been mired in a slump that saw him log seven consecutive strikeouts.

Branyan eventually forced Sabathia from the game by drawing a two-out walk in the sixth after falling behind 0-2 in the count. Later, he clubbed what manager Don Wakamatsu described as "a majestic" home run that soared in towering fashion over the center field fence in the ninth for a cushion Seattle badly needed.

But there's no getting around the fact Branyan might have to sit at some point this weekend.

"This is massive," Wakamatsu said of Gutierrez's recent offensive contributions, including a .304 batting average in May that's lifted his on-base-plus slugging percentage to .776 — 86 points higher than last year in Cleveland. "And to be able to put him in a spot like today, when Lopez didn't get any hits and Sweeney didn't get any hits and here he is, right behind them, putting a charge into three baseballs and just missing a fourth one.

"But what makes me happy is all the work he's done is paying off. He's really worked his tail off to make some adjustments."

Chris Woodward drove in a pair of runs, newcomer Ryan Langerhans had two hits, while Ichiro had a key two-run double in the fourth inning as well. Wakamatsu insists there's no one bat carrying the team at the moment and that's something Gutierrez, who slumped early this season when moved up in the order, tries to tell himself as well.

Even as the team keeps running him out there in Beltre's onetime No. 5 spot.

"I'm hitting in the middle of the order, but I don't feel any pressure," he said. "I don't want to change my approach. Because if I change my approach, I'm probably not going to hit."

And as long as his actions continue to speak volumes, nobody's going to complain about his choice of words.

Geoff Baker: 206-464-8286 or gbaker@seattletimes.com.