NEW YORK 7, MINNESOTA 1 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Monday, July 20.

Batting stars:  Steve Lombardozzi was 2-for-3 with a double.  Greg Gagne was 2-for-4 with a double.  Tim Laudner was 1-for-4 with a triple.

Pitching stars:  None.

Opposition stars:  Tommy John pitched a complete game, giving up one run on seven hits and a walk with one strikeout.  Mike Pagliarulo was 1-for-2 with a home run (his eighteenth) and two walks, scoring three times and driving in two.  Mark Salas was 3-for-4 with a three-run homer, his sixth.

The game:  There was no score until the fifth, when Pagliarulo hit a two-run homer.  Laudner tripled and scored in the bottom of the fifth to make it 2-1.  Salas then hit a three-run homer in the seventh to put the Yankees in control of the game.  They added single runs in the eighth and ninth.

Of note:  Dan Gladden went 2-for-4...Gagne was moved up to the second spot in the order for this game...Kirby Puckett was 0-for-4, dropping his average to .329...Mark Davidson played right field, with Tom Brunansky at DH and Roy Smalley out of the lineup...Laudner's triple was his only one for the season and one of five in his career...Les Straker pitched well other than the home runs, but his line was still seven innings, six runs, six hits, three walks, and four strikeouts...Four Yankees with Twins connections played in this game:  Salas, who had been a Twin; Pagliarulo, who would be one; Dave Winfield, who also would be one; and John, who broadcast cames for the Twins from 1994-96.  If you want to stretch a point, you could make it five, as Wayne Tolleson's son Steven was in the Twins farm system from 2005-09.