DETROIT 5, MINNESOTA 1 IN DETROIT
Date: Saturday, April 27.
Batting stars: Matthew LeCory was 2-for-4 with a double. Brian Buchanan was 2-for-4. Torii Hunter was 1-for-3 with a home run (his eighth) and a walk.
Pitching stars: Tony Fiore pitched four innings of relief, giving up one run on four hits and no walks with one strikeout. Jack Cressend pitched a perfect inning of relief.
Opposition stars: Nate Cornejo pitched a complete game, giving up one run on nine hits and a walk with eight strikeouts. Bobby Higginson was 3-for-4 with a triple. Randall Simon was 2-for-4 with a home run, his sixth.
The game: In the first inning, Higginson had an RBI triple and scored on Simon's single to give the Tigers a 2-0 lead. Hunter hit a one-out homer in the second to cut the lead to 2-1, but Detroit scored two more in the third on Simon's two-run homer to make it 4-1. The Twins left the bases loaded in the second and left two on in the third and fourth. They stranded ten for the game and went 1-for-10 with men in scoring position.
WP: Cornejo (1-2). LP: Matt Kinney (1-1). S: None.
Notes: LeCroy was again at DH...Buchanan was in right field, replacing Dustan Mohr...Jay Canizaro got the start at second base and was 1-for-1 with a hit-by-pitch...Jacque Jones was 1-for-5 and was batting .330...Hunter dropped his average to .366...LeCroy raised his average to .348...Buchanan raised his average to .333...A. J. Pierzynski was 0-for-4 to make his average .319...Matt Kinney started and pitched just three innings, allowing four runs on five hits and a walk with three strikeouts...Fiore gave up his first run of the season in ten innings...This was the only complete game and the only win of the season for Cornejo. He did pitch two complete games the next season, 2003. In 2002 he would stay in the Tigers rotation through May 20, then was sent to AAA, coming back as a September call-up. He would be in the rotation for all of 2003, but went 6-17, 4.67. For his career, he was 12-29, 5.41 in 56 starts. He wasn't all that good at AAA, either, going 13-8 but with a 4.24 ERA and a WHIP of 1.44. But the Tigers had terrible teams then, and he'd been a first-round draft choice, so he got his shot. He stayed in the Tigers organization through 2005, was in AAA with the White Sox in 2006, and then was done.