MINNESOTA 4, DETROIT 2 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Friday, April 12.

Batting stars:  Dustan Mohr was 2-for-3 with a walk.  Jacque Jones was 1-for-3 with a walk.

Pitching stars:  Brad Radke pitched 6.2 innings, giving up two runs on eight hits and a walk with two strikeouts.  J. C. Romero retired all four batters he faced, striking out two.  Eddie Guardado struck out all three men he faced.

Opposition stars:  Shane Halter was 2-for-4.  Mitch Melusky was 1-for-3 with a walk.

The game:  A week and a half into the season, the Twins finally got to play their home opener.  They scored all of their runs in the second inning, but that was all they needed.  With one out, Corey Koskie was hit by a pitch.  Mohr, A. J. Pierzynski, and Jay Canizaro followed with singles, the latter two driving in runs to make it 2-0.  Jones walked to load the bases.  RBI singles by Cristian Guzman and Doug Mientkiewicz made it 4-0.  The play-by-play makes it sound like only one of the singles was hit hard:  three of them were listed as ground ball through short left field or short center field, and another was a blooper.  Tigers starter Mark Redman (an ex-Twin, of course), must have been very frustrated.  Bobby Higginson led off the fourth with a triple and scored on a ground out for the first Detroit run and Andres Torres hit a sacrifice fly in the seventh to make it 4-2.  The last eight Tigers were retired, however, five of them by strikeout.

WP:  Radke (2-0).  LP:  Redman (0-2).  S:  Guardado (5).

Notes:  This was not the year Detroit threatened the all-time loss record, but they sure weren't very good.  This was their ninth game, and they fell to 0-9.  Something about that sounds familiar...Canizaro was again at second base, going 1-for-3...Mohr raised his average to .419.  He would hit .366 in April, .247 the rest of the way...Jones' average fell to .409...Redman pitched seven innings, giving up four runs on eight hits and two walks with four strikeouts.  Redman would go on to have a decent season, but his best season was the next year, 2003, when he got a World Series ring with the Marlins.  He would not have a good year after that, but still pitched for five more seasons...Up to this point, Romero had made seven appearances, covering 8.1 innings, and given up no runs on two hits and two walks with twelve strikeouts.

Record:  The Twins were 6-5, tied for second with Chicago, four games behind Cleveland.

CLEVELAND 8, MINNESOTA 4 IN CLEVELAND

Date:  Thursday, April 11.

Batting stars:  Torii Hunter was 3-for-4 with a home run (his fourth) and a double.  Cristian Guzman was 2-for-5.  Jacque Jones was 1-for-4 with a home run (his fourth) and a walk.

Pitching stars:  LaTroy Hawkins pitched two shutout innings.  J. C. Romero and Bob Wells each pitched a scoreless inning.

Opposition stars:  Omar Vizquel was 2-for-4 with a home run and a walk, scoring three times and driving in three.  Ellis Burks was 2-for-5 with a double.  Jim Thome was 1-for-2 with a home run (his second) and a walk.

The game:  Jones led off the game with a home run, giving the Twins a 1-0 lead.  Starter Kyle Lohse walked the first two batters (not the recommended way to start a game) and then gave up a two-run double to Burks, giving the Indians a 2-1 advantage.  Hunter led off the second inning with a home run to tie it 2-2.  Solo home runs don't hurt you, though, at least not when you have Thome to hit a two-run shot in the third to put you ahead 4-2.  In the fourth, an error by Guzman (his third in two games) brought home one run and Vizquel followed with a three-run homer to give Cleveland an 8-2 lead.  Doug Mientkiewicz singled home a run in the fifth and Bobby Kielty had an RBI double in the sixth, but that was as close as the Twins would come.

WP:  Bartolo Colon (3-0).  LP:  Lohse (0-1).  S:  None.

Notes:  Kielty made his first start of the season, playing right field and going 1-for-4.  His average was .167...Denny Hocking started at second base and was 0-for-3, dropping his average to .083...Jones average dropped to .415...Hunter raised his average to .325...Lohse pitched 3.1 innings, allowing eight runs (seven earned) on five hits and four walks with two strikeouts.  His ERA was 11.74...Colon didn't have a great game, either, pitching 5.1 innings and allowing four runs on seven hits and two walks with two strikeouts...Lawton was 1-for-3 with two walks to raise his average to .308...Thome's average went up to .200.

Record:  The Twins were 5-5, tied for second with Chicago and Kansas City, four games behind Cleveland.