Twins fall short against Giants again

Tim Lincecum pitched seven shutout innings and outdueled Brian Duensing as San Francisco beat the Twins 2-1 to take the finale of their three-game series and beat the Twins for the second straight game.

More details to come soon here at stattribune.com

The Twins will make a roster move after the game to make room for slugger Jim Thome's return, and manager Ron Gardenhire admits it's going to be a tough decision.

The Twins will send a catcher down after the game to make room for Thome, and Rene Rivera has done enough to make the Twins think about keeping him around. Rivera hasn't lit it up at the plate with a .180 average (Butera us batting .176) but has worked well with pitchers like Nick Blackburn.

Carl Pavano likes throwing to Butera, so both catchers have people on their side.

The thing to remember is that Joe Mauer is healthy now, so the backup catcher will play once, maybe twice, a week.

Mauer, of course, is not in the lineup today because it is a day game after a night game. Mauer was willing to play but Gardy made the call.

Rivera is in the starting lineup. Not sure if that's an indicator or not.

The Twins also will send a pitcher to Class AAA Rochester after the game to make room for the return of Joe Nathan. Jim Hoey is a candidate.

Tsuyoshi Nishioka is not in the starting lineup to rest a slightly sore hamstring.

Two odd notes from the broadcasting level of the pressbox. KSTP's John Gordon on Thursday chatted up Giants pitching coach Dave Righetti, who was at Class AAA Columbus in 1979 when Gordon called games there. And FSN's Robbie Incmikoski told me that he shared a house with Eli Whiteside in 2002 when he was the game-day host for the Bowie Baysox and Whiteside played there.

Righthanders Kyle Gibson (USA) and Liam Hendriks (World) have been named to the All-Star Futures Game to be played July 10 at Chase Field.

1. Ben Revere, CF
2. Alexi Casilla, 2B
3. Michael Cuddyer, RF
4. Delmon Young, LF
5. Danny Valencia, 3B
6. Luke Hughes, 1B
7. Rene Rivera, C
8. Matt Tolbert, SS
9. Brian Duensing, LHP

Giants (40-34)