MINNESOTA 6, KANSAS CITY 5 IN MINNESOTA
Date: Thursday, July 10.
Batting stars: Rich Reese was 2-for-3 with a walk. Harmon Killebrew was 2-for-4 with a home run (his twenty-fifth) and two RBIs. Rod Carew was 2-for-4 with a triple and a double, driving in two.
Pitching stars: Dave Boswell struck out six in 5.1 innings, giving up one run on five hits and a walk.
Opposition stars: Lou Piniella was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer, his ninth. Mike Fiore was 1-for-3 with a home run (his eighth) and a walk, scoring twice. Chuck Harrison was 1-for-2 with a two-run homer, his third. Don O'Riley pitched two shutout innings, giving up one hit.
The game: Pat Kelly led off the game with a double and stole third, but Boswell struck out Joe Foy, Fiore, and Piniella to keep the Royals off the board. The Twins got on that board in the bottom of the first. Ted Uhlaender walked and scored on a Carew triple. Killebrew later hit a one-out single to put the Twins ahead 2-0.
The Twins scored single runs in each of the next four innings. In the second, Cesar Tovar got an infield single, was bunted to second, and scored on Carew's double. In the third, Killebrew hit a home run. In the fourth, Tovar reached on a two-base error, was bunted to third, and scored on a pickoff error. In the fifth, Tony Oliva singled, went to third on a Rich Reese single, and scored on Johnny Roseboro's squeeze bunt. After that, the score was 6-0 Twins through five innings.
Apart from the first-inning threat, Kansas City really didn't do much in the first five innings. The best they could do was get a couple of guys on base with two out in the fourth. In the sixth, however, Fiore homered. Piniella reached on an error, Bob Oliver got an infield single, and Boswell was surprisingly removed from the game. Dick Woodson came in and got the Twins out of the sixth, but could not get the job done in the seventh. Ex-Twin Jackie Hernandez led off the inning with a single and Harrison hit a pinch-hit two-run homer. The next two batters were retired but Fiore walked, leading to Woodson coming out in favor of Ron Perranoski. He immediately gave up a two-run homer to Piniella, and suddenly the Twins lead was just 6-5.
Perranoski shut the door after that, though. He struck out Oliver to end the seventh and did not allow a hit the rest of the way. The only baserunner the Royals got was on a Paul Schaal walk in the eighth. The Twins held on for the 6-5 win.
WP: Boswell (11-8). LP: Dick Drago (4-8). S: Perranoski (17).
Notes: Uhlaender was again in left, with Tovar in center.
Carew raised his average to .356. Oliva was batting .331. Reese raised his average to .312. Perranoski's ERA went to 2.14.
The removal of Boswell in the sixth inning seems really out of character with the way Billy Martin had been handling his pitching staff this season. It's possible, of course, that Boswell wasn't feeling well or something and that led to him coming out early. But after Kelly's leadoff double he had given up just two more hits, both singles, through five innings. Granted that he gave up the home run to Fiore, but then came an error and an infield hit, so it's not like Kansas City was cuffing him around. It seems like an odd thing for Martin to have done.
Bringing in Woodson also seems like an odd decision. He had just pitched an inning and a third the day before and had not done all that well, giving up the losing run. And Woodson was apparently battling an injury--this would be the last game he would pitch until August 2. Now, second-guessing a manager fifty years after the fact is a tricky thing. There could have been all kinds of factors going into Martin's decision that we know nothing about. But from what we do know, this seems like a strange thing for him to have done. And while it didn't cost the Twins the game, you can't really say it worked, either.
Speaking of odd, first baseman Mike Fiore had kind of an odd career. 1969 was his rookie season, and as a twenty-four-year old he hit .274/.420/.428. He never got a chance to be a regular again. The Royals had a new manager in 1970, Charlie Metro, and according to Fiore Metro took an immediate dislike to him. Bob Oliver became the regular first baseman and Fiore was traded to the Red Sox in late May. The Red Sox had George Scott at first base, and also used Carl Yastrzemski there, and Fiore wasn't about to beat out either of them. He was traded to St. Louis in March of 1972, but they had Matty Alou and Donn Clendenon at first base. He spent 1973-1978 in AAA, most of those years for Baltimore. He had an OPS of over. 800 three times, one of them over .900, but never got so much as a September call-up. The Orioles had people like Boog Powell, Lee May, and then Eddie Murray at first base, and again there was no room for Fiore. For the teams with veterans, it's understandable why Fiore didn't get a chance. it's hard to understand, though, why the Royals wouldn't try to make something of a twenty-four-year-old with an OPS of .848. We'll never know what would've happened if they had, but given that they didn't have a first baseman do that well again until John Mayberry came along in 1972, it seems like it would have been worth their while to find out.
Record: The Twins were 49-35, in first place in the American League West, 3.5 games ahead of Oakland.