MINNEAPOLIS — For a few teasing moments Wednesday afternoon, it looked as if the Yankees might sneak away with a sweep in a game that was overshadowed by Aaron Judge’s early exit with an injury.
Like when Anthony Volpe lifted a two-run, two-out double to tie the game in the ninth inning.
Or when Ali Sánchez gave the Yankees their first lead of the day with a single in the 10th inning. Or when José Caballero put them back on top with a sacrifice fly in the 11th.
Or when they loaded the bases with no outs in the top of the 12th and looked primed to break the game open for good.
Instead, they just delayed the pain and frustration until the bottom of the 13th, when a bouncing ground ball slipped under the glove of George Lombard Jr. and sent the Twins to a 5-4 win at Target Field.
“Obviously a lot of good things, but not enough good things,” manager Aaron Boone said. “Tough one, obviously, when you got a chance to sweep and heading into an off-day. But we got to get over that and get ready for a good Diamondback club.”
On a day when Judge left the game in the top of the sixth inning with right lower leg tightness, the Yankees dropped to four games back of the Rays (pending their Wednesday night game) for the division with 10 games to play.
The walk-off “single” came off the bat of Victor Caratini against John Schreiber, and while it took a bounce off the mound, Boone acknowledged it was a play Lombard “expects to make and we know he can make.”
But the Yankees had plenty of other chances to win the game before it got to the 13th inning, even after they mustered just four hits through the first eight innings against right-hander Zebby Matthews and the Twins bullpen.
That best one came in the 12th inning, when they loaded the bases with no outs for Heliot Ramos, who had pinch hit for Judge in the sixth inning.
Ramos did just about the worst thing possible by hitting a chopper back to the mound, where Travis Adams started a 1-2-3 double play before Sánchez struck out to squash the threat.
Schreiber pulled off a Houdini escape in the bottom of the frame on just two pitches, when he intentionally walked the leadoff man, picked off the automatic runner at second base and then got an inning-ending double play.
Before the game went haywire, Carlos Rodón was solid, giving up two runs across six innings, extending his franchise record with a 25th consecutive start in which he has allowed three runs or fewer.
The left-hander’s velocity was down across the board in his first three innings but started to tick back up by the fourth inning.
“I just started off a little slow, a little tight,” Rodón said, indicating that was not totally out of the norm. “It loosened up on me going out the next few innings, so that was nice.”
