Yankees beat White Sox in 11 to move within two games of first place in AL East

CHICAGO — Forget the American League’s top wild-card spot.

The AL East title suddenly is very much in play for the Yankees.

On a night when their red-hot offense was mostly held in check, the Yankees — behind opposite-field RBI hits by Cody Bellinger, Jazz Chisholm Jr. and Anthony Volpe in the 11th inning — beat the White Sox, 5-3, to win their seventh straight game and pull within two games of the first-place Blue Jays.

The Yankees (76-60), who trailed the Blue Jays by 6 1⁄2 games as recently as Aug. 23 and had not been as close as two games since July 17, have won 14 of their last 18 games. They had not been 16 games over .500 since June 13.

The Blue Jays, Red Sox and Mariners each lost for the second straight day. The Yankees lead Boston by 1 1⁄2 games for the first wild card and are four games ahead of Seattle, which holds the third wild card.

“We’re playing well. We’ve got to keep it going,’’ Aaron Boone said. “This was a good win to get. This was a gritty one after pulling away in the first two with big numbers. To kind of find a way to get this one done is big, but we’ll enjoy it here for five minutes and it’s another big one tomorrow.”

David Bednar pitched a scoreless ninth and then worked out of a runner-on-third, one-out jam in the 10th. With his team employing a five-man infield, Bednar struck out Lenyn Sosa — the Yankees had gotten a break when Sosa’s fly ball down the rightfield line landed inches foul — and retired Colson Montgomery on a fly to right to end the inning.

“I thought it was fair off the bat,” Boone said of Sosa’s bid to end the game.

“I was blowing, hoping it would get foul,’’ catcher Austin Wells said. “I hope other people were blowing too.”

Entering the 11th, the Yankees had only three hits. With lefthander Tyler Alexander on the mound, pinch hitter Paul Goldschmidt’s line drive to right advanced ghost runner Trent Grisham to third. After Aaron Judge was intentionally walked, Bellinger blooped an RBI single to leftfield and Chisholm lined an RBI double down the leftfield line for a 4-2 lead. Bellinger was thrown out at the plate by first baseman Sosa on Wells’ bunt, but Volpe blooped an RBI double down the rightfield line that was about as fair as Sosa’s had been foul.

Camilo Doval, who has pitched erratically since being acquired at the trade deadline, allowed grounders by Andrew Benintendi and Will Robertson, with the ghost runner scoring on the latter, and struck out Edgar Quero in earning his first Yankees save.

The Yankees, who had hit 35 homers in their previous 11 games, got two more on Saturday night — Judge’s 42nd and Wells’ 19th. The latter’s blast, his fourth in his last eight games, gave the Yankees a 2-1 lead in the top of the seventh, but in the bottom of the inning, Devin Williams allowed a leadoff double by Curtis Mead and Chase Meidroth’s one-out single tied it.

The late-game theater overshadowed, though didn’t obscure, another terrific outing by hard-throwing Yankees rookie Cam Schlittler. Making his ninth career start, he allowed one run, four hits and a walk in six innings in which he matched a career best with eight strikeouts. Schlittler, who lowered his ERA to 2.61, has struck out eight in each of his last three outings and has 54 strikeouts in 48 1⁄3 innings.

“He’s a beast,’’ Wells said. “He just goes out there. It doesn’t matter who’s at the plate; I feel like for him, he’s going to go out there and throw his pitches and give us outs. I think he has three or four really good pitches that, as we’ve seen in every single outing so far, he can throw.”

Said Schlittler: “With each start, I’m definitely feeling more comfortable. Not trying to get too comfortable, but just kind of understand that I can go out there and be confident in myself and do what I need to do for hopefully six innings.”

He added: “I think the fastball was a little bit off today compared to some other starts, but in terms of generating miss and weak contact, I was pretty comfortable with it. But I think the cutter and the curveball were a lot stronger tonight than in some other outings. Being able to get that cutter back in there definitely made things a little bit easier for me.”

After Ben Rice struck out to start the fourth, Judge crushed a 1-and-0 changeup 429 feet to left-center for his fifth homer since coming off the injured list on Aug. 5.

The White Sox tied it in the fifth. Schlittler hit Mead to start the inning and was struck in the right forearm by a 102.1-mph line drive — resulting in a 1-3 groundout — by Brooks Baldwin. After Boone and trainer Mike Schuk watched Schlittler throw a couple of warmup pitches to make sure he was OK, he struck out Meidroth looking at a 97-mph sinker for the second out, but former Yankee Mike Tauchman stroked an RBI single to right.

“That was a lot of fun to be a part of,’’ Wells said. “For us, I feel like we’re just playing our game. Guys moving the lineup over and . . . the guys that came in out of the bullpen were lights out to put us in a position to win that game.”

By Erik Boland

erik.boland@newsday.comeboland11

Erik Boland started in Newsday's sports department in 2002. He covered high school and college sports, then shifted to the Jets beat. He has covered the Yankees since 2009.