Apparently, all Twins second basemen do is hit home runs.
Brian Dozier took a day off with a sore back and his replacement, Eduardo Escobar, hit a solo home run in the third inning and then walked with the bases loaded in the ninth inning for the only two runs of the game.
Kyle Gibson showed that he can pitch well on the road as well with seven shutout innings. He didn't exactly dominate with just three strikeouts and two walks, but he got more than twice as many ground balls as fly balls. That worked out for him despite the Twins' best defensive shortstop playing in Rochester and their best infielder on their roster on the bench.
Gibson played with fire by facing Miguel Cabrera in the most critical at-bats: once with two on and two out and the other with the bases loaded and two outs. The first situation, Cabrera hit a comebacker to end the inning and the second time, he hit into an inning-ending double play.
It was good for the Twins to get that extra run in the ninth, but it was painful to watch the struggles of Joe Nathan. It wasn't so much that he was struggling all that much as it was seeing him get booed off the field by the always classy Tigers "fans." (Yeah, booing a guy is really going to make him do better because he really wasn't trying until you started booing him.)
As much as Twins pitchers, especially starters, have struggled recently, I don't remember any of them getting booed off the field like that, especially after only allowing one run in a game the team was already trailing and it was all set up by an infield error.
The whole home/road thing for Gibson was always overblown, and maybe now people will stop talking about it. This isn't the first good road start he's had--he had a couple very good ones in Cleveland, too. All that happened is that he had a couple of really bad starts, they happened to be on the road, and they skewed the numbers.
To the Twins' credit, they never seemed to make much of it, either. I heard the media talk about it, but Gardy, Rick Anderson, and the rest never seemed too concerned. The one way this could've become a thing is if the coaches had started making it one and it got into Gibson's head. Kudos to them for not doing that.
I think booing is something I'm teaching the boy not to do. It's just silly, and bad manners. The only time I remember booing people are out and out jerks, or bad calls by the umpire. But even that's childish.
Don't forget pickoff throws by the opposing pitcher!!
Yes. This is the best time to boo.
Other times are intentional walks of the home-team slugger when he or a runner on base represents the tying or winning run, near-plunks (or actual) of the home team, when the visiting team takes offense to something and starts a brawl, and the visiting team's third (or later) pitching change of an inning.
I could be persuaded for a player that also appears to be a reprehensible person, but how much do we know and how much do we not?
Also, Brian McCann and the Yanquis.
But never ever a visiting former player. (Though reasons given for booing are not absolved just because they're former from the team. If Mike Redmond or Matt LeCroy visit as managers, they get booed for intent walks and excessive pitching changes.)