Twins 8, White Sox 4
MINNEAPOLIS -- The Chicago White Sox and Minnesota Twins treated Target Field Fans to a home-run derby Thursday afternoon, combining for six long balls. The Twins had four of the six, and upended the White Sox 8-4.
The Twins pounded starter John Danks, who struggled early, giving up the four homers and six runs. He threw 101 pitches in five innings, allowing 12 hits with no walks and two strike outs.
Twins starter Scott Diamond made it to the sixth inning, but needed help to get out of it, Chicago hit two long balls of their own.
Trailing by five entering the sixth, Alex Rios lead with a single over second baseman Brian Dozier's glove, and scored on Twins killer Paul Konerko's two-run shot. Adam Dunn then followed with his 19th homer of the season to make the score 6-4.
Diamond retired one more batter before leaving for Anthony Swarzak. Diamond lasted 5 1/3 innings, giving up four runs -- three earned -- on seven hits and one walk, while striking out two. He secured his fifth win.
The Twins, who had 15 hits in the game, came back in the sixth with a two-out rally started by Joe Mauer's double. Ryan Doumit reached on an error, Josh Willingham walked Justin Morneau hit a two-run single to make it 8-4.
The White Sox loaded the bases in the top of the ninth, but Jared Burton got Rios to fly to deep left to close down the White Sox, completing the series sweep.
Minnesota's Oswaldo Arcia hit his fifth home run of the season -- and his career -- over the right-field fence in the second inning. Clete Thomas followed with an infield single and scored on Dozier's third home run in four games.
Diamond started strong, holding the White Sox to one hit in three innings, but he gave up three hits and loaded the bases with two outs in the fourth. He then got Jeff Keppinger to ground to third, but Trevor Plouffe's throw pulled Morneau off the bag and Konerko scored. It was Plouffe's sixth error of the season.
The Twins got the run back in the bottom of the fourth when Thomas hit his first homer of the season. Eduardo Escobar homered to left three pitches later for a 5-1 lead.
Minnesota tacked on another run in the fifth when Plouffe singled, took second on a wild pitch and scored on Arcia's second hit of the game.
NOTES: The Twins have gone 12-17 against AL Central teams this season, winning three of their past four. ... The White Sox have committed two errors in a game 10 times this season and are on pace to make 115, which would be 45 more than their 2012 total of 70. ... Coming into the game, the Twins were hitting .299 (52-for-174) with 14 doubles, six home runs and 30 runs scored in their last five games against White Sox pitching.
