Mark Teixeira

New York Yankees' Mark Teixeira is the American League Player of the Week. (AP Photo | Bill Kostroun)

NEW YORK -- Well that was a slam dunk.

Yankees' first baseman Mark Teixeira was named the American League Player of the Week on Monday after a string of games where he was 8-for-24 with five home runs, 10 RBI and six runs scored across a seven-game stretch.

It's the fifth time in his career he's been named AL Player of the Week, announced Monday on MLB Network.

Yankees' slugger Alex Rodriguez, after hitting his 659th career home run on Sunday (and fifth of the season) told reporters that he wasn't carrying the team's offense, but that Teixeira was.

Indeed. The 35-year-old Teixeira has hit a home run in 7.8 percent of his at-bats this season, best in the bigs, and his eight homers are already the most he's had in any calendar month since June 2011 when he hit nine.

Last Friday against the Mets, Teixeira had his 38th-career multi-homer game, essentially powering the Yankees to the 6-1 win.

Teixeira's average is still (.242) below his career mark of .273, but manager Joe Girardi said last weekend he didn't care so much about that.

"I want the run production," Girardi said.

Ryan Hatch may be reached at rhatch@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @ryanhatch. Find NJ.com on Facebook.