The New York Yankees beat the Twins 8-4 Thursday night in the first game of a 4-game series at Target Field.  Joe Mauer was forced to play right field because of injuries to Matt Tolbert, Jason Kubel and Denard Span.  Mauer made the routine plays and was 1-3 at the plate with 1 RBI.  Tsuyoshi Nishioka went 2-4 with a run scored and 1 RBI and Ben Revere was 2-5 with 1 RBI.

Brian Duensing allowed 2-run homeruns to Mark Teixiera and Nick Swisher and gave up 6 earned runs in 5 innings to take the loss and drop to 8-12.  C.C. Sabathia got his 17th win for the Yankees.  The Twins honored Jim Thome prior to the game for hitting his 600th homerun earlier this week.

Minnesota is 54-69 and will host the Yankees again tonight at 7:10, pregame on WJON at 6:40.  Righthander Kevin Slowey (0-0) gets the start on the mound for the Twins and righthander Phil Hughes (3-4) toes the rubber for the Yankees.

The Twins placed outfielder Denard Span on the 15-day disabled list with migraine symptoms and recalled infielder Luke Hughes from triple-A Rochester.

More From AM 1240 WJON