Luis Gil and the Yankees were dominant on Tuesday night, because of course they were.
Not only did Gil throw another six shutout innings, but the Yankees extended their most recent winning streak to six games.
And it all came against the Yankees’ personal punching bag, the Twins, in a 5-1 victory in The Bronx.
It was hardly a surprise that Gil gave up just one hit in his outing or that Aaron Judge added a two-run double in the third and the Yankees hit a pair of homers, since they’ve been unstoppable against just about every team they’ve faced.
But they also improved to 4-0 versus the Twins this season, extending their streak of keeping the Minnesota lineup without a run for 32 straight innings until Royce Lewis took Tommy Kahnle deep with one out in the seventh.
Prior to that blast, the Yankees got a Gleyber Torres homer in the second, plus Judge’s wedge-shot of a double down the right-field line an inning later that scored two more.
With the victory, the Yankees are just one win shy of tying their season-best seven-game winning streak and are showing no signs of slowing down.
They entered with an MLB-best plus-107 run differential and with perhaps the hottest starter in the game.
Gil went 6-0 with a 0.70 ERA in six May starts and whiffed 31 batters in his previous three outings. He also entered 4-0 with a 1.27 ERA in five starts at home.
He “only” fanned six Tuesday night, but Gil also held the opposing team to three or fewer hits for the 10th time in 12 starts.
Torres, slowly showing signs of life at the plate, gave the Yankees a 1-0 lead with a two-out homer to right-center in the second.
It just eluded the reach of a leaping Max Kepler for Torres’ fifth home run on the year.
Three of those homers have come in Torres’ last 13 games.
The Twins threatened in the top of the third with a one-out double by Christian Vazquez, who moved to third on a Trevor Larnach groundout.
Gil recovered to get Carlos Correa looking on a 98 mph four-seamer. It was the first of three strikeouts Gil had against the shortstop.
Judge made it 3-0 with a two-run double that he dunked down the right-field line to score DJ LeMahieu and Anthony Volpe.
Kahnle replaced Gil to start the seventh and allowed his first run in five appearances this season.
Ian Hamilton tossed a scoreless eighth before Giancarlo Stanton iced it by crushing a two-run shot into the second deck in left field in the eighth.
Luke Weaver finished it with a perfect ninth.