MINNESOTA 5, BOSTON 4 IN BOSTON

Date:  Friday, August 9.

Batting stars:  Cristian Guzman was 3-for-5.  Torii Hunter was 2-for-4 with a double and a stolen base, his eighteenth.  Luis Rivas was 2-for-5.

Pitching stars:  J. C. Romero pitched 2.2 scoreless innings, giving up one hit.  Eddie Guardado struck out two in a scoreless inning, giving up one hit.

Opposition stars:  Nomar Garciaparra was 3-for-4 with a home run, his twentieth.  Brian Daubach was 2-for-3 with a triple.  Cliff Floyd was 2-for-4 with a double.

The game:  It was close all the way.  Garciaparra homered in the first to give Boston a 1-0 lead.  The Twins tied it in the second when Hunter doubled, took third on a ground out, and scored on a Doug Mientkiewicz sacrifice fly.  The Red Sox regained the lead in the third when Daubach tripled and scored on a ground out.  The Twins tied it again in the fourth when Hunter singled, went to third on a stolen base-plus-error, and scored on a Mientkiewicz single.  The Twins took their first lead in the fifth, as Rivas doubled and Guzman singled to put men on first and third with one out.  Corey Koskie singled in one run and another scored on a ground out, putting the Twins up 4-2.  The Red Sox opened the sixth with two walks and a wild pitch put men on second and third.  RBI singles by Garciaparra and Manny Ramirez then tied the game 4-4.  The Twins led off the seventh with consecutive singles by Rivas, Guzman, and Koskie to give the Twins a 5-4 lead.  A double play took them out of the inning, but it was enough, as the Red Sox managed only two singles the rest of the game.

WP:  Romero (8-1).  LP:  Frank Castillo (5-12).  S:  Guardado (34).

Notes:  Jacque Jones was not in the lineup, although he entered in the eighth inning for defense.  Michael Cuddyer was in right, with Dustan Mohr moving to left.  Luis Rivas went into the leadoff spot.  Cuddyer wetn 0-for-3 with a walk.

Tom Prince was the catcher in place of A. J. Pierzynski, going 0-for-4.

Hunter brought his average back up to .309.

Twins starter Kyle Lohse pitched five innings, giving up four runs on five hits and two walks and striking out one.

LaTroy Hawkins pitched a third of an inning and dropped his ERA 2.14.

Romero's ERA fell to 1.70.

Guardado's ERA was now 2.42.

Boston's starter was Casey Fossum.  He pitched 5.2 innings, giving up four runs on eight hits and a walk and striking out five.

People seem to have forgotten what a great player Nomar Garciaparra was.  He peaked early, which may be some of it--after batting .357 in 1999 and .372 in 2000, when he was 25 and 26, respectively, he never batted higher than .310 the rest of his career.  He had the bad luck to have his best years when Alex Rodriguez was just entering his prime, and as Rodriguez increased and Garciaparra decreased he lost some of his luster.  Still, he batted .313/.361/.521 over a fourteen-year career, made six all-star teams, was rookie of the year, and finished in the top ten in MVP voting four times.  That's a pretty darn good career.

Frank Castillo is another guy who turned a few good years into a long career.  He came up to the Cubs at mid-season in 1991 and turned in respectable numbers for a twenty-two year old:  5-6, 4.35, 1.25 WHIP.  He followed that up by going 10-11, 3.46, 1.18 WHIP in 1992.  He struggled through a sub-par (or so it seemed) 1993, missed much of 1994 due to injury, but came back in 1995 to go 11-10, 3.61, 1.23 WHIP.  Still just twenty-six, his future looked bright.  It wasn't.  He posted ERAs over 5.00 the next three seasons, which included time with Colorado and Detroit.  He was in AAA with Pittsburgh in 1999 and didn't do well there, either.  Given what might have been his last chance with Toronto in 2000, he went 10-5, 3.59, 1.22 WHIP.    He then went to Boston for 2001 and went a respectable 10-9, 4.21, 1.27 WHIP.  It was his last respectable season, though.  He struggled through a poor 2002, was in AAA with Oakland and Atlanta for all of 2003, and spent most of 2004-2005 in AAA as well, although he made two appearances with Boston in 2004 and one with Florida in 2005.  He pitched for York in the Atlantic League in 2007-2008 before ending his career.  He was 82-104, 4.56, 1.36 WHIP for his career.  He played for thirteen seasons, made 268 starts, and pitched 1595.1 innings.  He was a minor league pitching coach for a couple of seasons.  Sadly, his life story came to an end at the age of forty-four, as he drowned in Bartlett Lake in Arizona in 2013.

Record:  The Twins were 70-47, in first place, fourteen games ahead of Chicago.