American League Roundup : Improved Yankees Sweep Twins, Pull Within 4 1/2 of the Blue Jays

Manager Billy Martin has found a simple method to get the New York Yankees into the race in the American League East. He has done it by beating West Division teams at Yankee Stadium.

The Yankees won a doubleheader Sunday from the Minnesota Twins to complete a sweep of the four-game series, improve their record at home against the West this season to 18-2 and move within 4 1/2 games of division-leading Toronto.

Dave Winfield led off the bottom of the 11th inning of the opener with his 12th home run to give the Yankees a 3-2 victory and then Ken Griffey hit two three-run home runs in the nightcap to lead the Yankees’ 14-2 romp. Winfield was 5 for 10 for the day.

Dave Righetti pitched three innings of scoreless relief to win the first game, while Rich Bordi, also in relief, won the second. Bordi replaced Bob Shirley in the third inning and retired all 14 batters he faced before giving way to Mike Armstrong. Armstrong gave up one hit in the last two innings.

The Yankees are proving owner George Steinbrenner right when he says the league will have to do something about the weak Western Division, which has won only one championship series since 1974.

Of course, it hasn’t hurt to have a little luck, either. On Saturday night the Yankees, trailing, 6-2, were saved when a heavy rain washed out the game.

After losing his first two games in his fourth term as manager of the Yankees, Martin has turned New York into a winner and apparently a contender. The Yankees were 6-12 on May 1. Now, after winning 10 of their last 14 games they are 43-35. Instead of being tied for last, they are in third place.

Although he hit safely in both games to extend his hitting streak to 15 games, Don Mattingly fumbled a routine grounder in the second inning of the opener to end his errorless string at 153 games. This left him 40 games shy of Steve Garvey’s record for major league first basemen.

Toronto 8, Oakland 2--Although the Yankees seem to be making a move, the Blue Jays show no signs of a collapse.

George Bell celebrated his return from a two-game suspension by hitting a two-run home run and Ernie Whitt hit a three-run homer to make it easy for Jimmy Key to raise his record to 7-3 in this game at Oakland.

Key gave up five hits in eight innings, one of them Dave Kingman’s 21st home run.

The Blue Jays only managed a split in the four-game series, despite the hitting of Damaso Garcia. The leadoff hitter went 3 for 3 in the finale, scored a run and drove in another. For the series he was 7 for 15 and drove in seven runs.

Kansas City 8, Baltimore 4--Not since 1973 have the Royals lost a four-game series at home, but they were in danger of it when the Orioles took an early 2-0 lead.

Then George Brett went to work. The hot-hitting third baseman had three hits, including a triple, scored three runs and drove in two to lead a 14-hit attack that salvaged the last game of the series.

“It sure looked like another quiet night in the Royals’ locker room, didn’t it?� Brett asked. “But we’ve shown the ability to fight back and we did it again.�

Brett’s triple started a three-run third inning that chased Storm Davis. He had the third of five consecutive singles in the three-run fourth inning and drove in another with a ground-out in the eighth.

Almost always a hot hitter in July, Brett is 14 for 27 in the first seven days this year and has driven in 11 runs. He has raised his average to .344 and is in a position to challenge for the batting title.

Charlie Leibrandt, with help from Dan Quisenberry, won his eighth. Quisenberry gave up a home run to Cal Ripken in the eighth but pitched 2 innings to gain his 16th save.

Cleveland 10, Chicago 3--It was such a bad day for the White Sox at Cleveland that Manager Tony LaRussa sent in a couple of pitchers to bat.

Following an eight-run uprising by the Indians in the seventh inning, highlighted by Brett Butler’s bases-loaded single, the Indians brought Jamie Easterly in to pitch.

He seemed a little wild, so LaRussa sent in Dan Spillner to bat for Harold Baines and Gene Nelson to bat for Greg Walker. Spillner, who was 10 for 131 during his National League career, drew a walk. But Nelson, in his first time at-bat in the majors, lined into a game-ending double play.

Butler, who had three hits to lead the Indians’ 11-hit attack that ended a five-game losing streak, is batting .625 in bases-loaded situations this season.

Milwaukee 2, Seattle 1--Ted Higuera, with last inning help from Rollie Fingers, pitched the Brewers to victory in this game, but they could hardly wait to get out of Seattle.

“No offense to Seattle,� Manager George Bamberger said, “but this is one hell of a town for us. We play like horse manure.�

The win was the first for the Brewers in six games this season at the Kingdome. They have won only three of the last 15 they have played in Seattle.

“Everything that can go wrong has gone wrong for us in this town,� Fingers said after picking up his 10th save. “We’ve stranded runners, we’ve failed to get key hits, and when we hit the ball hard we’ve hit it right at people. We were due.�

Detroit 5, Texas 3--Frank Tanana struck out 10 of his former teammates in 7 innings at Arlington, Tex., to give him a 2-0 record since joining the Tigers. Before being traded the former Angel left-hander was 2-7 with the Rangers.

Darrell Evans hit a tie-breaking three-run home run in the eighth to give Tanana the victory.

When Tanana gave up a triple to Curtis Wilkerson in the bottom of the eighth, Willie Hernandez took over to earn his 18th save.