TWIN KILLING
Yankee bat stay hot, drill Minny again
The Yankees hit four homers for a second straight game in an 8-3 win over the Twins and have outscored their opponents 36-6 during their four-game winning streak that was extended Tuesday night in The Bronx.
Though it might seem like their offense is humming as well as anyone could have hoped, Aaron Judge — one of three Yankees to go deep in the victory — said there was still more to come.
“We’re getting there, we’re getting there,” Judge said after the Yankees bludgeoned their personal punching bags from Minnesota again to win their fourth straight and fifth in six games. “It’s still early. We’ve just got to stick to our approach, keep having good at-bats and grinding down the starters.”
They did that almost to perfection against Minnesota right-hander Jose Berrios, who entered the game having pitched at least seven scoreless innings in three of his four starts this year.
Tuesday was a different story, as Gary Sanchez took him deep in the second — the first of two homers by the catcher — and the Yankees scored in four of the five innings Berrios was on the mound.
Berrios was outdone by CC Sabathia, who kept the Twins off-balance all night, limiting them to an unearned run and two hits in six innings in the lefty’s second outing since he was sidelined by a strained hip.
Sabathia needed 23 pitches to get through the first inning, when he issued a two-out walk and then a double that Judge misplayed in right to allowed a run to score.
It was the first of four errors by the Yankees.
But the offense scored single runs in the second, third and fourth before Didi Gregorius continued his tear with his eighth homer of the season to put the Yankees up, 5-1
The lead seemed safe until Dellin Be- tances entered in the seventh and had another abysmal outing, as he struggled with his control again. He walked two, gave up a hit and made an error on a pickoff attempt before David Robertson was summoned to clean up the mess with the lead cut to three runs.
The Yankees answered with three runs in the bottom of the inning — with homers by Judge and Sanchez — to seal the win. Sabathia said he hasn’t been surprised by the recent outburst at the plate by his teammates.
“With our offense, just the names in the lineup takes pressure off you [as a starter],” Sabathia said. “At any point, they can do what they did tonight and the night before. It’s gonna happen. You never know who’s gonna hit a ball hard or go deep.” Lately, it’s been just about everyone. Miguel Andujar finally had his sevengame extra-base hit streak snapped, but Judge and Gregorius each had three hits and Gleyber Torres, playing in his third major league game, had two hits and his first RBI.
No one, though, did more damage than Sanchez, who has bounced back after a slow start to the year.
He has hit safely in nine of his past 10 games and gone 14-for-41, with 10 runs, five doubles, four homers and 15 RBIs.
On Tuesday, he hit his first home run to the opposite field and hit the other one into Monument Park in center.
“He shows when he uses the other way and the big part of the field, obviously he’s a guy that can drive the ball out anywhere in the ballpark,” manager Aaron Boone said. “He’s special when he’s controlling the strike zone. That’s his biggest challenge sometimes because he can get a little bit of a free-swinging thing going on and leave the zone a little too much. As long as he’s controlling that zone to some degree, he’s deadly when they come in there, no matter what pitch you throw.”
These days, that can be said about quite a .few Yankees.