Kuroda, Cano Help Yankees Beat Twins 2-0

NEW YORK (AP) — Hiroki Kuroda pitched five innings, the last after a long rain delay, Robinson Cano had another big hit against the Twins and the New York Yankees beat Minnesota for the fifth time in two weeks, 2-0 Friday night.

Brett Gardner and Cano had RBI singles in the fifth inning off the Twins bullpen after the Yankees had no success against Scott Diamond ahead of a 1-hour, 13-minute delay.

Boone Logan struck out the side in the seventh after relieving Preston Claiborne with two on. David Robertson was perfect in the eighth and Mariano Rivera finished off the eight-hitter for his 30th save.

New York was playing without captain Derek Jeter after he strained his right quadriceps in his first game this season on Thursday. Jeter will not play in this series and the Yankees will re-evaluate after the All-Star break.

The Yankees improved to 31-7 against Minnesota in New York since 2002. New York swept the Twins in four straight in Minnesota from July 1-4 and has won nine of 12 overall.

The Twins were coming off a four-game sweep at the hands of the Tampa Bay Rays and have lost 12 of 13.

Manager Ron Gardenhire talked before the game about not allowing Cano to beat him after the All-Star drove in nine runs during the sweep.

“Bounce it. Please bounce it,” Gardenhire said.

The first two times up, the plan worked. Diamond walked Cano. But after the rain, with Brian Duensing on the mound, Cano lined a single up the middle to score the Yankees’ second run of the fifth inning.

Luis Cruz had led off the fifth against Ryan Pressly (2-2), who took over for Diamond after the delay with one out in the fourth, with a single, just the Yankees’ second hit. Chris Stewart sacrificed him to second and Gardner slapped a single the opposite way to left field for a 1-0 lead. Gardner moved to second on the throw home.

Duensing relieved and got Ichiro Suzuki to ground to second. Gardner advanced and then scored on Cano’s hit.

That was more than enough to make Kuroda (8-6) a winner against a Twins lineup that had great difficulty getting hits with runners on. Against the 38-year-old righty, Minnesota had eight runners on but only got one hit when there was a man on base.

Kuroda allowed six hits and two walks. He struck out five.

Claiborne took over for the sixth and had New York’s first 1-2-3 inning. But he gave up hits to Pedro Florimon and Brian Dozier to start the seventh and yielded to left-hander Logan.

With the rain falling heavily again, Logan struck out Chris Parmelee. He threw a wild pitch that moved the runners up before fanning Joe Mauer, and during Justin Morneau’s at-bat threw another ball to the backstop but Florimon failed to score, even after Stewart flipped the slick ball past Logan, rushing to cover home.

After being called out by third base umpire on Kerwin Danley on a checked-swing strike three, Morneau flipped his bat on home plate and threw his helmet. Plate umpire Lance Barksdale angrily pointed to the bat and Morneau picked it up.

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