Mighty Yankees vs. Arraez and Twins is best June match-up in town — even if it hurts

Baseball's best team is in town. Don't take this the wrong way, but, enjoy.

The New York Yankees own baseball's best record. They have hit more home runs and allowed fewer earned runs than any other team. They have allowed the fewest home runs and held opponents to the lowest batting average — .210, a number that evokes memories of Koufax and Drysdale.

Their scheduled starting pitchers against the Twins this week are Jameson Taillon (6-1, 2.30 ERA), Nestor "The Tormentor" Cortes (5-1, 1.50) and Gerrit Cole (5-1, 2.78). Cortes owns baseball's best ERA, and outfielder Aaron Judge leads the majors in home runs, and if the season ended today, he would probably be the American League's most valuable player.

If the season ended today, though, that would be a shame, because if you live in Minnesota baseball doesn't get much better than this in June.

The Yankees bring story lines along with all that talent, as former Twin Josh Donaldson will face former Yankees Gary Sanchez and Gio Urshela, with Donaldson the most likely to say something everyone will regret.

The Yankees are again capable of reminding Minnesotans of the Twins' persistent inability to make themselves relevant rivals. Don't tell Twins fans that their postseason tormentors have won only as many World Series in the past 21 years as the Florida Marlins and Kansas City Royals.

The Yankees are good enough to dominate this three-game series and prompt existential dread in Twins fans, who should nevertheless swallow their fear.

The Twins are good, too — good enough that three days from now, when the Yankees are gone, they will remain in first place in the AL Central, with a chance for a roster that has distinguished itself with depth to regain its health.

After a winter of labor worries and a third of a season filled with injuries and illness, two first-place teams will play in one of America's best ballparks, and the underdogs have much to offer.

As good as the Yankees are, they have no one who runs or fields like Byron Buxton, who is emerging from one of the worst slumps of his career.

Carlos Correa, one of the game's best shortstops, should return from the COVID list during the series.

And America's biggest television market will be introduced to the new-and-improved Luis Arraez, one of the most entertaining and skilled players in baseball.

Entering Monday's games, Arraez led the majors in batting, with a .358 average. On Sunday, he went 4-for-4 with a walk to help the Twins win a series in Toronto against a good Blue Jays team.

Buxton is the Twins' most talented and important player, Correa their most accomplished, Royce Lewis their most promising. Jhoan Duran could become the most dominating reliever in franchise history.

Arraez is the soul of this team.

Signed to an estimated $40,000 signing bonus as an international free agent out of Venezuela, Arraez has become more than a bargain. He has become the Twins' epoxy player, willing to play any position and able to turn any at-bat into an emotionally charged miniseries.

He shakes his head after taking pitches out of the strike zone, recoils after foul balls, sprays line drives and somehow elicits memories of both Pete Rose and Tony Gwynn, or, if you are attached to Minnesota nostalgia, Rod Carew.

Arraez leads the Twins regulars in average, hits, on-base percentage and flamboyance, and his approach may give him the best chance of any Twin of putting up a fight against the Yankees' pitchers.

In his fourth season, he is a career .320 hitter, and he is notably leaner than he was last year. If he finished his career hitting .320, he would rank fifth in Twins-Senators history in that category, behind Carew (.334), Heinie Manush (.328), Goose Goslin (.323) and Sam Rice (.323).

If the Yankees are Goliath, Arraez is the Twins' slingshot.

Watching him against the best pitching in baseball, as those ominous gray road uniforms invade Target Field?

That's as good as June baseball gets in Minnesota.