ming off the disabled list Gregor Blanco Jersey , and the New York Yankees were off to a so-so September start.Facing the Minnesota Twins seems to be a cure-all.Sanchez had three hits, including a mammoth home run, J.A. Happ tossed six shutout innings and the Yankees continued their mastery of the Twins with a 7-2 win on Monday night.Could his first three-hit game since April 16 be a turning point for the catcher hitting .189?“I’ve hit the ball very hard all season and I haven’t got the results I wanted. If this is what it takes for me to find a good streak here or a good positive streak, yeah, why not,” Sanchez said through an interpreter.New York has beaten Minnesota nine straight times, including last year’s wild card game, outscoring the Twins 66-23. The Yankees are 20-4 in the teams’ meetings since July 25, 2015.The Yankees, 5-4 in the season’s final month, increased their lead over idle Oakland to three games for the first AL wild-card spot.Happ (16-6) allowed six hits and struck out three. Acquired from Toronto on July 26, the left-hander has allowed two or fewer runs in six of eight starts for New York, going 6-0 with a 2.70 ERA.“I ran into a couple outings before I came over where I really wasn’t getting strike one as much as I needed to,” he said. “Tonight, I felt like I was ahead in the count a lot and kind of forced them to be aggressive and swing.”Kyle Gibson (7-13) allowed four hits and one earned run in 5 2/3 innings. He was one batter away from tossing six shutout innings before Sanchez crushed low 2-2 fastball 460 feet into the third deck in left field.“We’ve talked before about a guy’s sweet spot, and some guys like the ball down and that’s probably on the fringe of where he likes the ball the most,” Gibson said.Before the bomb, Sanchez was 3 for 29 since coming off the disabled list on Sept. 1.“You always feel like he’s a guy that can get it rolling, and when he does http://www.giantsfanproshop.com/authentic-evan-longoria-jersey , he’s, from a talent standpoint, one of those guys that can carry a club offensively,” manager Aaron Boone said.New York’s first eight batters reached base in a six-run seventh. Miguel Andujar had a two-run double and later scored on a double by Giancarlo Stanton, who had been in a 3-for-35 slump. Didi Gregorius doubled home Stanton.New York was 5 for 17 with runners in scoring position after going 4 for 35 in its previous six games.“Finally, a lot of really good at-bats to kind of break that game open. It was something I feel like we needed and glad that a lot of guys had a hand in it,” Boone said.JUDGE GETS HIS CUTSYankees slugger Aaron Judge took on-field batting practice for the first time since fracturing his right wrist on July 26.The session included home runs to multiple fields by the 2017 AL Rookie of the Year.“It went really well; another big step for him to get out on the field,” Boone said.After the game, Judge refused to put a timeline on his return.“I really don’t want to put myself in a box by setting a date and then not making it. . I just need to keep moving forward until the day I get out there.”TRADING GEMSTwins left fielder Johnny Field made a sliding grab in the fifth to rob Andujar of a hit and save two runs. Third baseman Andujar returned the favor in the bottom of the inning, snaring a sharp liner by Field.TRAINER’S ROOMYankees: 1B Luke Voit has been dealing with back stiffness for a couple of days and wants to play through it, but Greg Bird got the start.Twins: 3B Miguel Sano missed his fifth straight game with lower left leg issues — including a sore knee that he sustained sliding into second base last Tuesday. … 1B Tyler Austin went through hitting drills and took batting practice but missed his fourth straight game with a stiff back.UP NEXTTo provide extra rest for Luis Severino and Masahiro Tanaka, New York’s Sonny Gray (10-8, 4.96) is scheduled for a spot start on Tuesday. Removed from the rotation in early August, Gray tossed 6 1/3 scoreless innings in his last spot start, on Aug. 25 in Baltimore. Minnesota will send RHP Tyler Duffey (1-2, 9.00) to the mound for his first start of the season.__ The Cubs got dominated all over the field on a sunny Saturday."I’m going to start this recap of the Cubs’ 6-0 loss to the Diamondbacks Saturday afternoon with the good news:Cubs pitchers struck out 11 D-backs.That’s it, pretty much. Oh, there was also this nice defensive play [VIDEO] by Kyle Schwarber in the first inning.Your browser does not support HTML5 video.That was on Yu Darvish’s second pitch of the game, a single by Jarrod Dyson that wound up in an out at second base on Schwarber’s good throw.But Darvish then served up back-to-back home runs to Eduardo Escobar and David Peralta and really Duane Kuiper Jersey , everyone could have gone home right then because the Cubs couldn’t do anything with Zack Greinke and D-backs reliever Taylor Clarke. The Cubs had just four hits and got just three runners past first base, one of them on defensive indifference in the ninth inning.So this is a tip o’ the cap to Greinke and Clarke, who were simply dominant. Clarke, incidentally, was making his major-league debut in this game. Clarke threw three innings and as a result, picked up a save in his first big-league game. He’s the first pitcher to do that since... another D-backs hurler, Jon Duplantier, did it three weeks ago against the Padres. Before that it had been almost 10 years since anyone had thrown 3+ innings in his big-league debut and gotten a save. Here’s the entire list. Clarke also got his first major-league hit.Why am I talking about that? Because there’s not much Cub to talk about in this game. Darvish, again, struggled with his command early, though his velocity was quite good. He allowed another run in the second inning on a sacrifice fly, and after that settled down. After he walked the first two hitters in that inning, Darvish retired 12 of the last 14 hitters he faced. So that’s... good, I guess. At 3-0 the game might still have been within reach; Darvish was lifted for pinch-hitter Mark Zagunis, who struck out. You know, Darvish could have done that, and maybe thrown one more inning (he was taken out after 88 pitches), and maybe the game stays 3-0.Instead, Allen Webster entered and got hit pretty hard http://www.giantsfanproshop.com/authentic-evan-longoria-jersey , allowing five hits and being charged with three runs (two earned), and that put the game out of reach. One of those five hits was a double by Greinke:That’s ... not good. (It should be noted also that Cubs pitchers, combined, have more extra-base hits than Zobrist and Almora. Jon Lester has one, a double.)On the “good” side of the ledger, Randy Rosario threw two scoreless innings in mopup duty. Again, that’s about all I’ve got. There’s this interesting pitching note regarding this game:If Yu Darvish is the only Cubs starter giving up runs over the next few weeks, the Cubs will be in good shape. Obviously that’s not likely to happen and we’d like to see Darvish throw better. This outing wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t really good either, and Darvish simply has to get more consistency with his good fastball. He did throw 50 of his 88 pitches for strikes, even while issuing two walks.After one like this, you pretty much have to say: “Go get ‘em tomorrow,” and so the Cubs will try for a series win Sunday afternoon with Tyler Chatwood on the mound. That doesn’t sound optimal, but perhaps he will surprise us with a good outing. Robbie Ray will go for the D-backs. In a change from the weather of the last two days, temperatures Sunday are expected to be in the 70s with the wind blowing out. Good times. Game time Sunday is again 1:20 p.m. CT and TV coverage will be via NBC Sports Chicago.