Randy Johnson allowed only a soft single in seven innings and Jason Giambi homered off Tim Wakefield to give the New York Yankees a much-needed 1-0 victory over the Boston Red Sox on Sunday.
After the teams exchanged sloppy wins in the first two games, they played nine crisp and tense innings, and the Yankees moved back within three games of the first-place Red Sox in the American League East with three weeks left.
"The big thing was not coming in here and getting swept," Boston's Doug Mirabelli said.
Wakefield (15-11) struck out a career-high 12 and pitched a three-hitter in his third complete game this season.
Boston's only hit off Johnson (14-8) was by Kevin Youkilis, who led off the fourth inning by lofting a 1-2 pitch into short left-center.
The Big Unit regularly hit 96-97 mph, according to the center-field scoreboard, which registered a 99 mph pitch to Johnny Damon in the third. He got Manny Ramirez to fly to center on a 98 mph fastball in the seventh inning, then struck out Kevin Millar on his 100th pitch to end the inning.
"That's the pitcher that everybody expected, and that's the pitcher that I'd expected," said Johnson, who improved to 4-0 against the Red Sox this season.
Indians 12, Twins 4
At Cleveland, Cliff Lee won his seventh straight decision and Cleveland hit for the cycle on the first nine pitches it saw in a rout of Minnnesota, stretching its winning streak to seven games.
Cleveland had 17 hits to win for the 18th time in 23 games and maintain its 1 1/2-game lead over the New York Yankees in the AL wild-card race. The Indians also pulled within 5 1/2 games of first-place Chicago in the AL Central.
Pedro Martinez stopped his own two-game skid as well as New York's six-game losing streak, pitching eight strong innings against St. Louis in a 7-2 Mets win.
Carlos Beltran homered and Mike Jacobs doubled twice with an RBI to help the Mets beat the Cardinals for the first time in 12 games on the road and avoid a four-game sweep. Victor Diaz hit a three-run homer in the ninth.
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