MINNESOTA 6, DETROIT 0 IN MINNESOTA
Date: Friday, May 10.
Batting stars: Mitch Garver was 1-for-1 with a two-run homer (his eighth) and three walks, scoring twice. Max Kepler was 1-for-4 with a home run, his eighth. Jorge Polanco was 1-for-4 with a walk and three RBIs.
Pitching stars: Jake Odorizzi pitched seven shutout innings, giving up one hit and no walks and striking out five. Matt Magill struck out two in a perfect inning. Fernando Romero pitched a scoreless inning, giving up two hits and striking out one.
Opposition stars: None.
The game: Christin Stewart doubled with one out in the first, but did not get past third base. That was the only baserunner the Tigers would get off Odorizzi, and the only runner they would get until the ninth.
Meanwhile, the first six Twins also went out. After that, though, things got better. In the third, Garver walked and Jonathan Schoop singled. With one out, Kepler walked to load the bases and Polanco delivered a two-run double to put the Twins up 2-0.
In the fourth, Marwin Gonzalez was hit by a pitch and Garver followed with a home run, making the score 4-0. Kepler led off the fifth with a home run to make it 5-0. In the sixth, Gonzalez got an infield single and walks to Garver, Byron Buxton, and Polanco forced home a run to bring the score to 6-0.
The Tigers opened the ninth with singles by Grayson Greiner and JaCoby Jones, their first baserunners since the first inning. A strikeout, a force out, and a lineout ended the inning and preserved the shutout.
WP: Odorizzi (5-2). LP: Tyson Ross (1-5). S: None.
Notes: Garver is batting .364 with an OPS of 1.228. Polanco is batting .341 with an OPS of 1.056.
Odorizzi has an ERA of 2.32. If you could throw out the game against Philadelphia, his ERA would be 1.50. He has not given up a run in his last three starts (twenty innings) and has struck out twenty over that span, allowing just seven hits and five walks. Over his last five starts (31.1 innings) he has allowed three runs on twenty-one hits and six walks. I think you could say he's on a roll. He's obviously not going to keep that up all season--he'd win the Cy Young award unanimously if he did--but he's sure pitching well right now.
Fernando Romero is now unscored upon in his last five games. Granted, it's only four innings, and he's allowed four hits and three walks. Still, his ERA has come down from 11.25 to 5.62. It's improvement.
Matt Magill is also unscored upon in his last three games (three innings). He has struck out four and has allowed just one hit and no walks, dropping his ERA from 6.75 to 3.18.
There was a scary moment in the sixth inning when, on a play at first base, Gonzalez' head collided with the knee of Niko Goodrum. Reports this morning are that Gonzalez has cleared the concussion protocol and is day-to-day, which is certainly good news. I expect he won't play today, and maybe not tomorrow, but if the reports are correct and nothing else happens, he should be good to go soon.
The Twins have a record of 24-12. That means they have won exactly two-thirds of their first thirty-six games. Granted that it's still May, and thirty-six games represents just two-ninths of the schedule. Granted, as well, that the Twins haven't always played the toughest schedule. But even granting all that, winning two-thirds of your games over a thirty-six game span is an achievement. It would be unusual for a bad team to be able to do that, even against weak competition. Again, lots of things (injuries, slumps, etc.) can happen. But it certainly appears that the Twins are a good baseball team this season.
Record: The Twins are 24-12, first in the American League Central, 4.5 games ahead of Cleveland.
Projected record: We're still on track for 150-12!