CHICAGO 13, MINNESOTA 10 IN CHICAGO
Date: Wednesday, September 16.
Batting stars: Greg Gagne was 3-for-5 with a home run (his seventh) and two doubles, scoring twice and driving in two. Dan Gladden was 2-for-5 with a home run (his seventh) and a double, scoring twice and driving in two. Chris Pittaro was 2-for-4 with two runs.
Pitching star: Steve Carlton pitched two shutout innings of relief, giving up two hits and a walk with two strikeouts.
Opposition stars: Harold Baines was 3-for-5 with a home run (his nineteenth) and a double, scoring twice and driving in four. Ozzie Guillen was 3-for-5 with three doubles, scoring twice and driving in three. Greg Walker was 2-for-5 with a home run (his twenty-fifth) and a double, scoring twice.
The game: Gladden led off the game with a home run to put the Twins up 1-0. The White Sox got the run back in the second, but the Twins got single runs in the third and fifth to lead 3-1. That's when it went bad. Chicago got three doubles in a five-run fifth to go ahead 6-3 and scored seven times in the sixth, getting a two-run homer from Baines and a solo shot from Walker, to take a 13-3 lead. To the Twins' credit, they came back and made a game of it. Gagne homered and Don Baylor doubled in a three-run seventh that made it 13-6. Gary Gaetti hit a two-run double in a three-run eighth that made it 13-9. They scored once more in the ninth to cut it to 13-10, but could not get the tying run up to bat before the game ended.
Of note: Gladden was not only back in the lineup, he was in center field, with Kirby Puckett given the day off. Puckett was used as a pinch-hitter in the ninth and popped up, making his average .326...Randy Bush batted third and played first base, with Kent Hrbek out of the lineup...Billy Beane was in right field, with Tom Brunansky again shifting to left...Pittaro was at second base, with Steve Lombardozzi out of the lineup...Mike Smithson started for the Twins but pitched only 4.2 innings, allowing six runs on six hits and two walks with two strikeouts...Jose DeLeon was the Chicago starter. He went 6.2 innings, allowing six runs (four earned) on seven hits and four walks with six strikeouts...This was one of two times the Twins used Carlton in relief. Cleveland had pitched him in relief nine times. Before the 1987 season, the last time he had been used in relief was 1971.
Record: The Twins were 77-70, in first place by 3.5 games over both Kansas City and Oakland. The Royals lost to California 6-4 and the Athletics fell to Texas 4-1.