Game Preview: New York Yankees @ Minnesota Twins 6/16

The New York Yankees must be glad to get out of the rarified air in Colorado and into an environment where a lazy fly ball doesn’t go 500 feet off the bat. New York left Colorado yesterday and will be inside Minnesota’s Target Field tonight for the first of a four-game set between the two clubs. The Yankees will send their 5^th starter CC Sabathia to the mound fresh out of the fountain of youth to take on Kyle Gibson for the Twins.

Sabathia has been nearly untouchable since coming off the disabled list with a strained groin and has easily been the Yankees best pitcher during that stretch. Whether it’s a healthy groin muscle, a clear mind, a new knee brace or all the work on his cutter with Mariano Rivera and Andy Pettitte that is to blame for this renaissance who knows but I’m not one to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Gibson has made all of one start since returning off the disabled list with a shoulder strain and as you can imagine he struggled in that outing against a tough Red Sox offense. Gibson did go 5.2 innings in the start but he allowed five runs and seven hits in a Minnesota loss. Not bad after missing 42 games with the injury I guess.

The game will be played at 8:10 pm ET inside Target Field and can be seen on the YES Network and MLB TV. No Phil Hughes this series and no John Ryan Murphy but we can always pass the time by placing bets on how many times Eduardo Nunez’s batting helmet will fall off. That’s always fun, I’m going with 12 spread across the four games. Leave your predictions in the comments section. Oh, and go Yankees!