The Twins, with some help from Boston, extended their lead over the Chicago White Sox in the AL wild car race. Detroit's loss also moved them to within 4 games of the Central leading Tigers. The Twins open up a 4-game series against the Tigers on Thursday.

Santana was dominant in his start on Tuesday night. He picked up his 17th win of the season and pretty much solidified the Cy Young award for the season. Roy Halladay is really the only pitcher that compares to Santana and he falls short of Santana in every of the important categories. Santana pitched eight shutout innings—allowing just 2 hits and a walk while striking out 12. Simply put, the Devil Rays didn't have a chance.

The Twins offense showed some signs of life with eight runs. The Twins didn't hit any homeruns (Cuddyer was robbed of one by the umpire in the seventh), but did get three doubles and a triple on their way to 8 runs.

Game Notes

• It took Santana only 95 pitches to get through eight innings. Matt Guerrier pitched the ninth
• Joe Mauer was 1-4 with a 2 RBI double and walked once.
• Nick Punto was 1-5 and struck out in the third with one out and a runner on third. The runner was stranded at third that inning.
• Cuddyer, Morneau and Bartlett each had 2 hits and 1 RBI.
• Morneau has 115 RBI and Cuddyer is inching closer to 100—currently at 92.
• Tampa Bay made three errors in the game including two costly errors in the third that led to the Twins three runs that inning

Silva on Wednesday

• Silva will try to keep the Twins in the win column on Wednesday. The Tampa Bay offense has been friendly to Twins pitching so far, so hopefully they'll keep that trend going.