Minneapolis ? Ron Gardenhire drives over that bridge to work every day.

“Obviously, a baseball game is kind of secondary around here,” said the Twins’ manager, who was on the Interstate 35W bridge near the Metrodome hours before the bridge collapsed Wednesday. “All of our thoughts and prayers are with the folks over there around the bridge and the people working to try and save everybody’s lives. There was a ball game that had to be played. I don’t think a lot of us wanted to be out there, but it was the right thing to do.”

After a moment of silence to honor victims of the collapse, the Kansas City Royals defeated the Minnesota Twins, 5-3, in 10 innings.

Today’s game between the teams was called off, but the Twins decided to go ahead with this one instead of sending about 25,000 fans back out onto the congested highways.

Alex Gordon hit a two-run homer in the 10th inning as the Royals won hours after manager Buddy Bell announced he will resign after the season.

“Things always get put into perspective,” Bell said. “This game is important to all of us, but there is nothing as precious as life. We all know that.”

The Twins had their four-game winning streak snapped.

The Twins postponed the series finale and today’s groundbreaking ceremony for the their new stadium. The team said a weekend series against Cleveland could also be affected.

“I just tried to focus on the game and turn the switch on,” Twins starter Boof Bonser said. “I had to almost take the minds off of thinking about that.”

Bonser rebounded from his last start against Cleveland, when he lasted only 22â3 innings. The big right-hander fanned four over seven innings and scattered eight hits.

Yankees 8, White Sox 1

New York – Alex Rodriguez went 0-for-4 and remained stuck at 499 career homers and matched the longest hitless streak of his big-league career at 21 at-bats. Jorge Posada homered twice, and Derek Jeter, Robinson Cano and Shelley Duncan also connected to give the Yankees 13 home runs in two games. That tied the team record for a two-game span set in a doubleheader at the Philadelphia Athletics on June 28, 1939.

Red Sox 5, Orioles 4

Boston – David Ortiz scored the go-ahead run in a four-run seventh inning that gave Boston the win in front of Kevin Garnett.

Athletics 3, Tigers 2

Oakland, Calif. – Mark Ellis hit a go-ahead home run in the sixth inning.

Devil Rays 6, Blue Jays 2

St. Petersburg, Fla. – Carl Crawford had three hits, including a two-run homer, to lead Tampa Bay. Crawford connected off Josh Towers (5-8) in the sixth to put Tampa Bay up 3-2.

Rangers 9, Indians 6, 10 innings

Cleveland – Rookie reliever Jensen Lewis failed to get an out on consecutive bunts in the 10th inning, and Texas took advantage to send the Indians to their fourth straight loss and seventh in nine games.