MLB: Branyan hits restaurant in center field at Yankee Stadium

9 bucks for a Yankee root beer float? I’d break a few windows too!

After going nearly two games without hitting a ball between the white lines at Yankee Stadium, Mariners first baseman Russell Branyan hit one where no else has gone.

Branyan took one of his husky swings at the first pitch he saw from right-handed reliever Alfredo Aceves in the ninth inning of the Mariners’ 8-4 win over the Yankees on Thursday night and drove the ball majestically to straightaway center field.

It had distance, it had height and it caromed off the dark glass protecting the Mohegan Sun Sports Bar, located above Monument Park, becoming the first player to hit the structure in the first season of the new stadium.

The Yankees apparently don’t measure opponent’s home runs, but this was a long one.

“That was majestic,” Mariners manager Don Wakamatsu said. “[Alex Rodriguez’s] was measured at 439 feet and this one went way beyond that one.”

...“I think that one is going to be hard to top in this ballpark,” Wakamatsu said.