Yankees power to 5-2 victory over Twins as relievers yield home runs to break open tie game

NEW YORK — The official boxscore will say the Yankees defeated the Twins 5-2 on Monday. But it might be more apt to say Aaron Judge actually won the game.

"He pretty much just single-handedly beat us," Twins starter Chris Archer said. "What he's doing is very, very impressive."

Judge reached base in three of his four plate appearances: a double in the first, a walk in the third and a two-run homer in the sixth. Emilio Pagan struck him out in the eighth, but the game was well in hand by then.

The 30-year-old center fielder is a favorite for the American League MVP this season as the most prolific hitter in the game. With his .302 batting average, he's crushed 54 home runs — three in the past three days — and has 117 RBI. He's on pace for 65, which would break the AL home run record of fellow Yankees outfielder Roger Maris, who smashed 61 in 1961.

And while the 81-54 Yankees have flagged a bit recently, especially offensively, Judge has carried them through the struggles and kept the team atop the East Division. The 68-65 Twins fell one game behind Cleveland in the Central Division and are one game up on the third-place White Sox.

Judge did have some help Monday, though, mostly from ex-Twins. Josh Donaldson brought Judge home on a base hit after that first-inning double. Marwin Gonzalez hit a solo home run off Archer in the third. Ahead of Judge's sixth-inning homer, Gleyber Torres clipped a leadoff single off reliever Trevor Megill. And Isiah Kiner-Falefa homered in the seventh with Pagan on the mound.

Kiner-Falefa, whose home run was only his second of the season, was a member of the team for little over a day in March when he was acquired from Texas and then traded to the Yankees in the deal that sent Donaldson to New York.

Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said Judge's season is extraordinary, especially considering how offense as a whole has been down this year across the league. But he wasn't reading too much into the multiple Yankees homers, especially since Yankee Stadium has a tendency to allow big hits.

"We pitched them reasonably tough, and it was fine. But honestly, when you leave some pitches where you don't want to, and good hitters hit them on the barrel in this ballpark, they're generally going to go," Baldelli said. "And that's why they won."

The Twins did at one point tie the game, from the most fitting source, at that. Gary Sanchez, a homegrown Yankees player who came to the Twins in the Donaldson trade, delivered a two-run homer in the fifth to make it 2-2. That ball sailed 473 feet past the left field bleachers in Sanchez's first return to Yankee Stadium as a visitor.

Per Statcast's measurements since 2015, that's the longest homer from an opponent at Yankee Stadium and the fourth-longest overall. The top two spots belong to 2017 Judge at 496 feet and 495 feet, but another from Sanchez when he was a Yankee is third at 481 feet from the 2019 season.

Both Sanchez and Gio Urshela, who was also part of the Donaldson trade, received a warm welcome from the 38,446 announced fans in attendance when they first stepped up to bat.

"It felt really good," Sanchez said in Spanish through an interpreter. "Really exciting to be back to play against the team that gave me the opportunity to come to play in the big leagues. It felt good that I hit it at the moment that I did because we tied the game."

Sanchez recognized this was one of his longest home runs and also the longest home run from a Twins players this season. And he called it "memorable" for that reason. But it couldn't become his favorite for one simple reason.

"If it would have helped the team win, it would've been better," Sanchez said. "But it's up there."