MINNESOTA 6, KANSAS CITY 2 IN KANSAS CITY

Date:  Tuesday, September 23.

Batting stars:  Rich Reese was 2-for-4 with three RBIs.  Rod Carew was 2-for-5 with a stolen base, his nineteenth.  Tony Oliva was 2-for-5.

Pitching stars:  Dave Boswell pitched seven innings, giving up two runs on four hits and four walks and striking out six.  Tom Hall pitched a scoreless inning, giving up one hit.  Ron Perranoski pitched a perfect inning.

Opposition star:  Mike Hedlund pitched seven innings, giving up four runs (three earned) on eight hits and a walk and striking out three.

The game:  The runs came in pairs.  The Twins started it by getting two in the first inning.  Ted Uhlaender reached on an error and Oliva hit a one-out single.  Harmon Killebrew walked to load the bases and Reese delivered a two-run single to make it 2-0.

Kansas City drew a pair of one-out walks in the second but did not score.  In the third, Carew singled and reached third on a stolen base-plus-error with none out, but did not score.  in the bottom of the third, the Royals tied it.  Alcaraz and Fiore started the inning with singles and runners were at first and third with one out.  A ground out scored one and a Joe Foy single made the score 2-2.

The Twins got the lead back in the sixth.  Oliva, Killebrew, and Reese all singled to make the score 3-2.  With two out, Rick Renick hit another single to make it 4-2.  Kansas City did not get a man past first base after the third inning.  In the ninth, Rick Dempsey singled and Renick walked.  An error brought home one run and Uhlaender's sacrifice fly rounded out the scoring.

WP:  Boswell (19-11).  LP:  Hedlund (3-6).  S:  Perranoski (28).

Notes:  Uhlaender was in center field, with Cesar Tovar on the bench.  Graig Nettles played left field.  Renick was at shortstop, with Leo Cardenas on the bench.

Carew was batting .334.  Reese was batting .321.  Oliva was battine .312.  Perranoski's ERA was 2.25.

This was the major league debut for Rick Dempsey, who went 1-for-2.  He would appear in five games in 1969, going 3-for-6 with a double and a walk.  He would ultimately appear in 1765 major league games over twenty-four seasons.

Boswell had nineteen wins with one, possibly two, starts remaining.  Would he get number twenty?  We will see.

Record:  The Twins were 93-61, in first place in the American League West, ten games ahead of Oakland.  They had clinched first place in the division.