ANAHEIM 4, MINNESOTA 3 IN ANAHEIM (13 INNINGS)
Date: Saturday, May 25.
Batting stars: Denny Hocking was 2-for-5 with two doubles. Jacque Jones was 2-for-6. Dustan Mohr was 1-for-4 with a walk.
Pitching stars: Matt Kinney pitched 6.2 innings, giving up two runs (one earned) on seven hits and one walk while striking out five. LaTroy Hawkins struck out four in two shutout innings. J. C. Romero retired all four batters he faced.
Opposition stars: Adam Kennedy was 2-for-5 with a double. Darin Erstad was 2-for-4 with a walk and a stolen base, his sixth. Jarrod Washburn pitched eight innings, giving up three runs on four hits and three walks while striking out seven.
The game: The Angels took the lead with two in the second on a run-scoring double by Kennedy and an RBI bunt single by Jose Nieves. Hocking's two-run double tied it in the fifth. The Twins took the lead 3-2 in the top of the eighth when Hocking again doubled and scored on a Cristian Guzman single. Eddie Guardado came in to pitch the ninth and Twins fans were confident, but Scott Spiezio drew a one-out walk and pinch-runner Julio Ramirez scored from first on a double by Bengie Molina. The Twins put two on with two out in the top of the thirteenth, but David Ortiz flied out to end the threat. In the bottom of the thirteenth, Tim Salmon made the first pitch Jack Cressend threw the last pitch he would throw, sending it over the fence for a walkoff home run.
WP: Al Levine (2-1). LP: Cressend (0-1). S: None.
Notes: Tom Prince caught in place o A. J. Pierzynski. He was 0-for-4, dropping his average to .306...Hocking was once again at second. This game gave him a four-game hitting streak in which he was 7-for-15...Romero's ERA fell to 0.33...Mike Jackson pitched a scoreless inning to make his ERA 0.90...Hawkins' ERA dropped to 1.95...Cressend had four consecutive scoreless appearances, covering 7.2 innings, before this game. His ERA had dropped from 8.82 to 6.00...Julio Ramirez, who scored the tying run, had a brief career, but it spanned five seasons. A native of the Dominican Republic, he signed with the Marlins when he was sixteen in 1993. An outfielder, he made his major league debut with Florida in 1999 as a September call-up, appearing in fifteen games but starting just four of them and getting only twenty-one at-bats. He was primarily used as a defensive replacement and pinch-runner. He was traded to the White Sox for 2001 and played in twenty-two games for them, starting twelve and getting thirty-seven at-bats. He moved on to the Angels for 2002. The game we're dealing with here came in the middle of a six-week stretch he spent in the majors, going down in mid-June and coming back in September. He again didn't play much, appearing in 29 games but making just seven starts and getting just thirty-two at-bats. He was with the Angels for six games in 2003 and with San Francisco for twelve games in 2005. His career line is .167/.216/.229 in 96 at-bats. Given that he was so often used as a defensive replacement or a pinch-runner, one assumes he was fast, but he attempted only five stolen bases and was successful only twice. He stole much more often in the minors, getting 327 stolen bases (in 442 attempts). He stole 135 stolen bases over two minor league seasons, getting 71 in the Florida State League in 1998 and 64 in the Eastern League in 1999. He wasn't just a slap singles hitter, though, as he hit 101 minor league home runs, with a high of 23 for AAA Fresno in 2005. On the one hand, it seems kind of unfair that teams kept calling him up and then not giving him a chance to play. On the other hand, his AAA line is .253/.292/.399, which is not all that impressive, so maybe he should feel fortunate that he spent as much time in the majors as he did.
Record: The Twins were 27-22, in second place, a game behind Chicago.