Yankees allow many homers, one rare play in Sabathia fiasco

MINNEAPOLIS — When Target Field opened almost a decade ago, Twins players griped it was difficult to hit a ball out of the jewel of a ballpark.

Monday night the ball refused to stay in play when the Yankees and Twins, teams built on the home run, slugged it out in the first of three games between the AL East and Central leaders.

With the help of a first-inning triple play when the Twins turned Edwin Encarnacion’s ground ball to third into three outs, the hosts held on for an 8-6 victory in front of 34,627.

A year ago the Yankees set the all-time major league home run record with 267 and this year’s Twins are on pace to shatter that. Monday night they hit five to hike their major league-leading total to 187. Mitch Garver clubbed two and Jorge Polanco, Nelson Cruz and Max Kepler had one each.

The 64-35 Yankees dropped a second straight game but it wasn’t because they didn’t hit. Gior Urshela, Luke Voit and DJ LeMahieu homered and Mike Tauchman went 3-for-4, scored twice and drove in a run.

CC Sabathia didn’t make it past the fourth inning in his shortest outing of the year. He gave up seven runs (six earned) and six hits (a season-high four homers). Sabathia entered the game with a 2-0 record and a 3.24 ERA in the previous four starts (three Yankee victories) but fell to 5-5. In a dozen starts against the Twins as a Yankee, Sabathia was 8-1 with a 3.01 ERA. In his career, Sabathia was 20-9 with a 3.09 ERA versus the Twins in 39 starts.

“It’s really important,’’ Boone said of the series. “But I would say that even if we were playing a team that wasn’t leading a division.’’

The loss didn’t cost the Yankees ground to the second-place Rays in the AL East because they were beaten by the Red Sox and remained nine lengths behind. The third-place Red Sox pulled to 10 games back of the Yankees.

The Yankees were 21-10 at Target Field but had lost the last two series at the park that opened in 2010.

Luis Cessa replaced Sabathia to start the fifth inning with the Yankees trailing, 7-5. On several levels Sabathia’s 16th start was the worst of his final season.

The four innings were his shortest stint, the seven runs (six earned) were a season-high as were the four homers he allowed.

The long ball barrage continued in the fifth when Tauchman led off with a single and LeMahieu followed with a towering homer to left that reduced the Twins’ lead to 7-5. It was LeMahieu’s 15th homer of the season and tied a career high for the infielder.

When Twins starter Martin Perez walked Aaron Judge for the third time he was replaced by right-hander Tyler Duffey who walked Encarnacion before Gary Sanchez’s elongated slump continued with a liner to left for the first out.

Aaron Hicks’ grounder to the right side forced Encarnacion at second and Luke Voit whiffed to strand two.

Kepler led off the fourth with his 25th homer and upped the Twins’ lead to 6-3. That went to 7-3 Mitch Garver’s 19th homer just made it over the left-field wall. In 15 starts this year Sabathia’s season-high in homers was three and that was in one game. In 3 2/3 innings he allowed four.

Voit’s opposite-field homer to right field with one out in the fourth shaved the Twins’ lead to 5-3. It was Voit’s 19th of the season.

The Twins loaded the bases in the third with a four-pitch walk to Luis Arraez, Garver’s grounder to third baseman Urshela that he made a diving stop on but couldn’t get an out at second and Polanco dropping a soft single into right-center field.

Cruz reached on catcher’s interference when his bat struck Sanchez’s glove hand and forced in a run. Eddie Rosario’s grounder to the right side resulted in a force out at second and Garver scoring. Another fielder’s choice plated Polanco for a 5-2 Twins lead.

After the first-inning triple play allowed Perez to escape a first-inning jam he struck out Sanchez, Hicks and Voit in the second.

The third frame didn’t go so well for the left-hander who gave up a solo homer with one out to Urshela that cut the Twins’ lead to 2-1. Tauchman singled to center and scampered to third on LeMahieu’s opposite-field double into the right-field corner. Judge battled out of a 0-2 hole to draw a full-count walk that loaded the bases for Encarnacion and his bloop single to center scored Tauchman and tied the score, 2-2. Sanchez extended a slump to 10-for-77 by banging into a 5-3 inning-ending double play.

Sabathia spent time visiting local youngsters with the Twins’ Michael Pineda and Cruz behind the Yankees’ dugout.

A few hours later Cruz was the back end of the Twins hitting consecutive homers off Sabathia in the home first.

Polanco drove a 0-1 pitch into the left-field seats with one out and Cruz followed by hitting a 2-2 offering into the bullpen area in left-center field.

Coming after Encarnacion hit into a 5-4-3 triple play in the top of the first the opening inning couldn’t have gone much worse for the Yankees.

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