MINNESOTA 5, KANSAS CITY 4 IN MINNESOTA (10 INNINGS)

Date:  Sunday, August 4.

Batting stars:  Luis Rivas was 2-for-3 with a two-run homer, his third.  Doug Mientkiewicz was 2-for-5.  Torii Hunter was 2-for-5.

Pitching stars:  LaTroy Hawkins pitched two shutout innings, giving up one hit.  J. C. Romero pitched a scoreless inning, giving up one walk.

Opposition stars:  Carlos Beltran was 3-for-5 with a home run (his nineteenth) and a stolen base (his twenty-seventh).  Michael Tucker was 2-for-2 with a triple, a double, three walks, and a stolen base, his seventeenth.  Aaron Guiel was 2-for-2 with a double and a hit-by-pitch.

The game:  Beltran hit an inside-the-park home run in the first to give the Royals a 1-0 lead.  The Twins took the lead 2-1 in the third on Rivas' two-run homer.  Kansas City went back in front in the fourth when Joe Randa singled, Tucker tripled, and Chan Perry singled.  Mientkiewicz delivered an RBI single in the bottom of the fourth to tie it 3-3.  It stayed 3-3 until the seventh, when A. J. Hinch singled and scored from first on a Guiel double.  In the bottom of the ninth Corey Koskie led off with a walk, but was thrown out trying to score from a first on a Rivas single to center.  Rivas took second on the play, however, and scored on an infield single-plus-error by Jacque Jones to tie it 4-4.  The Royals opened the tenth with two walks and drew another walk with two out to load the bases, but Guiel grounded out to end the inning.  In the bottom of the tenth, Hunter and David Ortiz led off with singles and Dustan Mohr walked to load the bases with none out.  Jason Grimsley came on to strike out Mientkiewicz, but Koskie grounded to first base.  Perry tried to touch first and then throw home for the double play, but Hunter beat the throw for the winning run.

WP:  Romero (7-1).  LP:  Scott Mullen (3-3).  S:  None.

Notes:  Michael Cuddyer started at third in place of Koskie and went 0-for-3.  Koskie came in as a pinch-hitter in the ninth.

Tom Prince started at catcher and went 1-for-2 with a walk.  A. J. Pierzynski came in as a pinch-hitter in the ninth.

Hunter raised his average to .316.

Twins starter Kyle Lohse pitched six innings, giving up four runs on seven hits and three walks and striking out four.

Hawkins lowered his ERA to 1.49.

Romero lowered his ERA to 1.80.

Rivas hit his second home run in as many days.  He had only one before these two games and would end the season with four.

What a frustrating series this had to be for the Royals.  Swept in a three-game series with each game decided by one run and two of them in extra innings.

This was one of five games in which Chan Perry played in 2002.  He had played thirteen for Cleveland in 2000.  He was 1-for-14 in 2000 and 1-for-11 in 2002, making him 2-for-25 (.080) for his career.  He had no extra base hits and did not draw any walks, so his career line is .080/.080/.080.  His AAA numbers were decent but nothing special:  .280/.326/.419.  He was primarily a first baseman but played a fair number of games in the outfield and a handful at third base.

We hope to return with real player profiles in a couple of days.

Record:  The Twins were 69-43, in first place, leading Chicago by seventeen games.