The Yankees already have faced and beaten the Twins five times this century in the postseason, and while the playoffs are fickle — particularly the one-game wild card — when the Yankees looked across the field they saw an inferior team.

This time they will see a Minnesota squad much like themselves — a 100-win club with power up and down the lineup, real questions about rotation depth/quality and a strong, deep (if relatively unknown) bullpen.

“There really is some schoolyard bully to their game — they can ambush you, hit you and hit you some more from a lot of places in the lineup, and if they get the lead they are tough,” said a scout who covers the Twins. “You better be ready to stand up to them from the first pitch and not rest with that lineup. There is real length there.”

Will the Yankees make it 6-for-6 against the Twins in the postseason? With the help of three scouts, a dive into the Division Series that begins Friday in the Bronx:

Right makes right

Last season, against lefty pitching, the Twins hit 36 homers and had a .698 OPS. This year, they led the majors with 95 homers — nine more than the runners-up Yankees and Dodgers — and an .872 OPS. Their .521 slugging percentage versus lefties is second all-time to the 1955 Brooklyn Dodgers (.536).

There were 22 players with at least 100 plate appearances versus lefties and a better-than-1.000 OPS. No other team had more than two. The Twins had four: Nelson Cruz (1.207 OPS vs. lefties) set the franchise record, Mitch Garver (1.170) was third-best in franchise history, plus C.J. Cron (1.020) and Miguel Sano (1.007). Even the three lefties in the order — Eddie Rosario, Max Kepler and Luis Arraez — do not back down against southpaws. For example, Arraez drew 18 walks against nine strikeouts versus lefties and Kepler slugged .524.

James Paxton will pitch prominently in the series. You wonder if this minimizes how much Aaron Boone can trust J.A. Happ in relief, because Happ yielded 28 homers to righties, tied for second-most in the AL. It enlarges just how big a loss it is not to have Dellin Betances and, especially, Domingo German, who could have provided just not righty stuff, but length if necessary.

This intensifies the burden on the Yankees’ primary relievers, because even lefties Zack Britton and Aroldis Chapman are excellent against righties, Tommy Kahnle is very good and Adam Ottavino — one of the keys to this series — is superb. The wild card is Chad Green because he can give multiple innings, and in his revived second half, righties hit just .133 against him.

Bombas vs. Bombers

Rosario, the Twins’ left fielder, said in late May, “When you’re hitting a lot of bombas, everybody’s hitting a lot of bombas, everybody’s happy.” Thus was born The Bomba Squad that now takes on the Bronx Bombers. The Twins finished with a record 307 homers, the Yankees 306.

The Yankees set the record for players with double-digit homers (14). The Twins set the record for players with 20-plus homers (eight) and 30-plus homers (five), four of whom were homegrown: Garver, Kepler, Rosario and Sano.

“Top to bottom, the Twins are going to hit homers,” one scout said. “You make a mistake, they take you out of the yard. And, to me, the Yankee starters have made lots of mistakes this year. You want a significant thing for me in this series: The Yankees better have their secondary stuff working.”

The scouts concurred on two key Twins — Cruz and Arraez.

“Cruz is their aircraft carrier,” one scout said. “When he is in the lineup, he just makes it easier for all the others.”

The scouts also agreed on tactics to go after him: “You better pitch him hard inside. I know how dangerous that is, because if you miss, if this guy gets to extend his arms at all, even at pitches a little off the plate, he is going to do big damage.” Once established inside, Cruz will get even more into swing-and-miss mode on breaking balls away.

The scouts loved Arraez because he offered diversity — the one Twins piece who was more line-to-line and line-drive oriented and not looking to go deep. He walks more than he strikes out. He will foul off lots of tough pitches to extend at-bats. He can’t run well, but still hit .334 in 366 plate appearances. But he sprained his right ankle the final weekend of the season — so how much does he play?

Is Jose the Johan?

The Twins have played 15 postseason games against the Yankees. They have won two. Johan Santana started both — Game 1 in 2003 and in 2004. Jose Berrios is the closest to a true ace Minnesota has had since Santana was traded to the Mets after the 2007 season.

He was not quite as overpowering this year as he was last year, but as one scout said, “Berrios has great [stuff]. You get him on the right night, he can pitch to anybody and win. He is unique. Usually guys with power sinkers and sliders come from high slots. He is three quarters, he has a whip, really sneaky and quick. Righties have a hard time seeing it. And you will get 95 [mph] on your hands, then he mixes in the slider away, and that is tough. But when he does not have his best fastball movement and sink, which happens on occasion, he gets a lot of plate.”

Which guy do the Yankees see? Because after Berrios is Jake Odorizzi. In May, Odorizzi blanked the Yankees over six innings riding his fastball up in the zone. In July, the Yankees battered him for nine runs in four innings. Odorizzi had the AL’s third-best OPS against righties (minimum 300 righty plate appearances) at .585, behind Tampa Bay’s Charlie Morton (.562) and Houston’s Gerrit Cole (.571), but Edwin Encarnacion and Gleyber Torres took Odorizzi deep in July.

Minnesota has another drop-off after Odorizzi — maybe they use out-of-nowhere rookie Randy Dobnak and they stay away from Kyle Gibson and Martin Perez. Don’t laugh, Yankees fans — the Twins really miss Michael Pineda (who was suspended for violating MLB’s PED policy).

Relief surprise

Taylor, Trevor and Tyler. Boy band? Nope. Taylor Rogers, Trevor May and Tyler Duffey are the big arms of a Twins pen made deeper by the in-season acquisition of Sergio Romo.

The Yankees’ main four relievers (Britton, Chapman, Kahnle and Ottavino) were better this season, but the Twins quartet holds up well. The Yankees foursome’s ERA was 2.41 compared to the Twins’ 2.74. The Twins crew actually struck out more per nine innings (11.71 to 11.49) and walked fewer (2.32 to 4.28). The batting average against was .201 for the Twins quartet and .189 for the Yankees.

Perhaps the big difference was in homer susceptibility — a major theme in this series. The Twins foursome allowed 27 in 213 ²/₃ innings to the 20 in 246 innings by the Yankees.

“Their bullpen is sneaky good,” one scout said. Another scout offered, “Their main guys are strike-throwers with good stuff, and Romo, honestly, he throws below hitting speed. He throws nothing but sliders. I don’t know how he does it, but there is no fear in that guy.”

Rogers, who had 30 saves, is a lefty who actually gets out righties way more efficiently. But one scout noted, “I don’t know how available he is to them on back-to-back days in a short series. You might as well use him more than one inning and then give him a day or two off. He isn’t a big, physical guy.”

When Rogers has one or no days off between appearances, his opponents’ slash line is .308/.385/.558 in 119 plate appearances with a 6.20 ERA. With two or more days of rest, the slash line is .169/.190/.214 in 159 plate appearances with a 0.61 ERA.

Details, details

The Twins emphasize pitch-framing and getting strikes. Note how Garver, their catcher, almost always sets up with one knee on the ground to accentuate the low strike. But that makes him a little slower to pounce if a ball ricochets away or pop up on a steal attempt. The Yankees have to be alert to taking extra bases.

Conversely, the Twins are no steal threat. They had just 28 steals — the seventh-fewest in the divisional era (since 1969) — and half of them (14) were by Byron Buxton, who is out injured. They were caught 21 times and had just one steal of third base all year.

When the series shifts to Target Field, note that in right field, there is a concrete slab that is above the padded wall. Said one scout: “Your center fielder is really key there. He must trail the play, because if the right fielder gets too close to the fence and it hits the concrete, it is going to ricochet hard toward the infield and that could be giving away a triple.”