MINNESOTA TWINS 6, CLEVELAND INDIANS 5 IN CLEVELAND (GAME 1–10 INNINGS)

Date:  Friday, August 25, 1967.

Batting stars:  Harmon Killebrew was 3-for-4 with a triple, a walk, and two RBIs.  Mudcat Grant was 2-for-2.  Tony Oliva was 2-for-4.  Ted Uhlaender was 2-for-5 with a two-run homer (his sixth) and three runs.

Pitching star:  Ron Kline pitched four innings of relief, giving up one run on three hits and one walk and striking out two.

Opposition stars:  Chuck Hinton was 3-for-5 with a home run (his eighth) and two runs.  Duke Sims was 2-for-4.  Max Alvis was 2-for-5.  Vic Davalillo was 2-for-5.  Joe Azcue hit a home run, his ninth.  Orlando Pena pitched three shutout innings of relief, giving up one hit and striking out two.

The game:  With one out in the first Ted Uhlaender singled, went to third on a Cesar Tovar single, and scored on a sacrifice fly to put the Twins up 1-0.  Chuck Hinton homered leading off the bottom of the first to tie it 1-1.

The Twins regained the lead in the third when Ted Uhlaender reached on an error, was bunted to second, and scored on a Harmon Killebrew single.  In the fourth Mudcat Grant singled with one out and scored on a two-out two-run homer by Uhlaender to put the Twins up 4-1.

Cleveland got one back in the fourth when Vic Davalillo led off with a single, went to second on a ground out, and scored on a two-out single by Max Alvis.  In the fifth, two-out singles by Chuck Hinton, Davalillo, and Leon Wagner produced a run to cut the lead to 4-3.  In the sixth, Max Alvis led off with a single and, with two out, Larry Brown singled and Don Demeter doubled to tie it 4-4.

It stayed 4-4 until the tenth.  Tony Oliva led off the inning with a single and Harmon Killebrew followed with an RBI triple.  A sacrifice fly scored him to give the Twins a 6-4 lead.  In the bottom of the tenth, Joe Azcue hit a home run to cut it to 6-5, but no one else reached base and the Twins were victorious.

WP:  Ron Kline (6-0).

LP:  John O’Donoghue (7-7).

S:  None.

Notes:  Hank Izquierdo was behind the plate in place of Jerry Zimmerman.  Jackie Hernandez was at short in place of Zoilo Versalles.  Cesar Tovar was at third.  Rich Rollins played the most games there with 97, with Tovar following at 72.  Sandy Valdespino was in left in place of Bob Allison.

Hank Izquierdo was batting .333.  He would finish at .269.

Stan Williams started for Cleveland.  He would pitch for the Twins from 1970-1971.

Hank Izquierdo came up to the Twins in early August and stayed the rest of the season.  He played in sixteen games and got twenty-six at-bats.  That was his only major league action, and when he made his debut he was thirty-six years old, which has to be one of the oldest debuts ever.  He was born in Cuba and made his professional debut in 1951 at age twenty.  He played in the Cleveland, Baltimore, Cincinnati, Minnesota, and Houston organizations.  He never hit–the only year he had an OPS of over. 800 was 1955 in Class B Keokuk.  He obviously loved baseball–he played in the Mexican League until he was forty-three, and managed there as well.  Later, he was a scout for the Twins and the Cubs.

Jim Perry pitched in relief.  He was mostly used out of the bullpen in 1967, making eleven starts and twenty-six relief appearances, pitching 130.2 innings.  He had led the league in starts in 1960 and would do so again in 1970.

Record:  Cleveland was 60-69, in seventh place in the American League, 12.5 games behind Minnesota.  They would finish 75-87, in eighth place, seventeen games behind Boston.

The Twins were 71-55, in first place in American League, a half game ahead of Boston and Chicago.  They would finish 91-71, tied for second with Detroit, one game behind Boston.

Random Record:  The Random Twins are 48-46 (.511).