Gary Thorne could probably use a break from the New York Yankees.
Thorne, announcing for Baltimore fans on MASN, provided one of the week’s more amusing moments with his incredulous reaction to yet another home run by New York’s Gleyber Torres against the Orioles. Torres has hit 13 home runs this season, and 10 of them have been against Baltimore.
When Torres went deep in the third inning Wednesday night, Thorne’s reaction felt appropriate.
“That’s to left-center field. Wilkerson back - I, I don’t know,” he said with a mixture of resignation and bewilderment.
“He is just unstoppable,” Thorne added. “And it’s all home runs against the Orioles.”
Torres homered again later in the game.
The Yankees have fought through all sorts of injury problems to lead the AL East. Torres and Gary Sanchez have combined for 28 home runs, 19 against Baltimore. New York homered 13 times in its four-game sweep of the Orioles. The Yankees are 10-2 against Baltimore on the season, with 35 home runs so far.
There are still seven games left between the two divisional foes, but the rest of them aren’t until August.
The Orioles lost 115 games last year, and this season has been similar so far. They’re 16-37 and have already allowed 114 homers in 53 games. After the series against the Yankees, Baltimore had to go to Coors Field, where the Orioles allowed seven homers in three games against Colorado.
New York has been without Giancarlo Stanton for almost the whole season because of biceps issues, and Aaron Judge has hit just five home runs in the 20 games he’s played. Judge is sidelined by a left oblique injury.
The Yankees are still getting power from Sanchez, Torres, Clint Frazier and Luke Voit. They lead Tampa Bay by two games atop the division.
BIG LEAD
Although it might feel that way to the Orioles, the Yankees aren’t even close to leading the major leagues in home runs. That honor belongs to the Minnesota Twins at the moment. The Twins have hit 104, with Eddie Rosario (16), C.J. Cron (13), Max Kepler (12) and Jonathan Schoop (10) all in double figures. Cleveland has won the AL Central by a combined 38 games over the past three seasons, but the Indians are in real trouble at the moment, languishing around the .500 mark and trailing the Twins by 10 games.
Minnesota has baseball’s best record, top run differential and biggest division lead. A win over the Chicago White Sox on Sunday was the Twins’ sixth in a row.
HIGHLIGHT
The White Sox turned a triple play on Houston’s Jake Marisnick on Wednesday night. With men on first and second, Marisnick hit a grounder to third baseman Yoán Moncada, who was right at the bag when he fielded the ball. He stepped on the base to start the 5-4-3 triple play.
LINE OF THE WEEK
Wil Myers homered twice and walked three times in San Diego’s 19-4 victory over Toronto on Saturday. The Padres hit a franchise-record seven home runs.
San Diego is 28-25, a respectable showing after the arrival of free agent Manny Machado. The Padres have been without star rookie Fernando Tatis Jr. this month because of a hamstring injury. His absence prevented the San Diego-Toronto series from matching Tatis against Blue Jays rookie Vladimir Guerrero Jr.
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