ATLANTA 3, MINNESOTA 2 IN MINNESOTA
Date: Wednesday, June 12.
Batting stars: Cristian Guzman was 2-for-4 with a double. Doug Mientkiewicz was 1-for-4 with a triple. Denny Hocking was 0-for-1 with two walks.
Pitching stars: Johan Santana struck out eight in 4.2 innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and three walks. J. C. Romero retired all four men he faced. Mike Jackson and Eddie Guardado each pitched a perfect inning.
Opposition stars: Damian Moss struck out eight in seven shutout innings, giving up two hits and two walks. Rafael Furcal was 3-for-5 with two doubles and a stolen base, his fifteenth. Gary Sheffield was 2-for-3 with a home run (his tenth) and a walk.
The game: Furcal led off the game with a double and scored on Sheffield's single to give the Braves a 1-0 lead. It stayed 1-0 until the fifth, when Furcal again doubled and scored on a pair of wild pitches. Sheffield hit a home run in the seventh to make it 3-0. Meanwhile, the Twins had only three hits through eight innings and only once advanced a man as far as second base. In the ninth, however, Guzman doubled and scored on a Mientkiewicz triple. Mientkiewicz came home on a ground out to cut the lead to 3-2, but there were now two out and no one on base. Torii Hunter grounded out to end the game.
WP: Moss (3-2). LP: Santana (1-1). S: John Smoltz (19).
Notes: Jacque Jones was given the day off, with Dustan Mohr in left. Luis Rivas was moved up to the leadoff spot, going 0-for-3...Matthew LeCroy was again the DH in place of David Ortiz, going 1-for-3...Hocking was at third base, replacing Corey Koskie...LeCroy's average was now .338...Hunter went 0-for-4 and was batting .300...Kielty was 0-for-2 to make his average .333...Mohr was 0-for-3 and was batting .310...A. J. Pierzynski was 1-for-3 and was batting .332...Santana threw 107 pitches in his 4.2 innings...Romero's ERA went down to 0.70...Jackson's ERA was 0.95...To be honest, I don't remember anything about Damian Moss. He had a good year in 2002, though, going 12-6, 3.42, 1.28 WHIP, and finishing fifth in Rookie of the Year voting. He had a FIP of 4.77, however, which would've been a warning sign if anyone had known what FIP was in 2002. He's a native of Australia and signed with the Braves as a free agent. He did well in the low minors, didn't do much in AAA, then missed all of 1998, presumably due to injury. He struggled when he came back in 1999, did better in 2000, and had a fine season in AAA in 2001, although he made only sixteen starts. He made five appearances for the Braves that season and was with them all of 2002, his first full season in the majors. He tended to walk too many batters, walking 4.5 per nine innings that season (he had a seven-inning no hitter against St. Louis, but was pulled because he had given up seven walks), which was another warning sign. The Braves may have picked up on some of these warning signs, because after the season they traded him to San Francisco for Russ Ortiz. He struggled with the Giants in 2003 and was sent to Baltimore at the July trade deadline in a deal that involved Sir Sidney Ponson. He became a free agent after the season, signed with Tampa Bay, and spent most of the year in the minors, making only five appearances with the big club. Those would be his last five appearances in the majors. He kept trying, however, and teams kept giving him chances, hoping he could repeat that 2002 season. The Devil Rays released him in August of 20034and he signed with Cincinnati. He was in the minors with Seattle in 2005, was back in the minors with Atlanta briefly in 2006, was in independent ball for most of 2006 and all of 2007, was back in the minors with Atlanta in 2008, and was in AAA with Colorado for 2009 and 2010. He never really accomplished much in any of those places, but I guess you have to give him credit for persistence. It appears that he has become an agent, working for Integrity Sports Agency in Dublin, Georgia.
Record: The Twins were 37-29, in first place by four games over Chicago.