Tag Archives: catcher triples

Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Thirty-eight

CALIFORNIA 6, MINNESOTA 5 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Sunday, May 24.

Batting stars:  George MItterwald was 3-for-4 with a home run (his third), a triple, a double, and two RBIs.  Harmon Killebrew was 3-for-4 with a double and a walk.  Leo Cardenas was 2-for-5 with two runs.  Tony Oliva was 2-for-5.

Pitching stars:  Tom Hall pitched 3.1 scoreless innings, giving up two hits and a walk and striking out two.  Steve Barber pitched a scoreless inning, giving up one hit.  Stan Williams pitched two shutout innings, giving up three hits and striking out one.

Opposition stars:  Joe Azcue was 3-for-4.  Sandy Alomar was 3-for-5 with a stolen base (his fourteenth), two runs, and two RBIs.  Alex Johnson was 2-for-3 with a walk.  Jim Fregosi was 2-for-5 with a double and two RBIs.  Roger Repoz was 1-for-5 with a two-run homer, his seventh.

The game:  Alomar led off with a single and Repoz hit a two-run homer, giving the Angels a quick 2-0 lead.  The Twins got one back in the bottom of the first when Cesar Tovar doubled, went to third on a ground out, and scored on Killebrew's infield single.  But California scored three more in the second.  Singles by Bill Voss, Azcue, and Alomar produced the first run and put men on first and third.  Alomar stole second and Fregosi followed with a two-run double, putting the Angels up 5-1.

The Twins put two on with one out in the fourth, but did not score again until the fifth when Mitterwald hit a home run.  They again put two more men on base, but the score remained 5-2.  They got another run in the sixth when Cardenas singled with two out, Mitterwald doubled, and a passed ball scored a run.  They again got a two-out run in the seventh when Killebrew doubled and scored on an Oliva single.  With one out in the eighth, Cardenas singled and scored on a Mitterwald triple, tying the score 5-5.  They missed and chance to take the lead, however, as a pair of ground outs followed.

It cost them, as California took the lead back in the ninth.  Azcue singled, was bunted to second, and scored on an Alomar single.  The Twins got two on with two out in the ninth on a pair of walks, but Steve Kealey came in and struck out Cardenas to end the game.

WP:  Paul Doyle (2-0).

LP:  Ron Perranoski (3-2).

S:  Kealey (1).

Notes:  Rick Renick was at third, with Killebrew moving to first.  The Twins pretty much emptied their bench.  Minnie Mendoza pinch-hit for Hall in the fifth.  Rich Reese pinch-hit for Barber in the sixth and stayed in the game at first base, with Killebrew moving to third.  Jim Holt pinch-hit for Williams in the eighth.  Holt stayed in the game and went to left field, with Brant Alyea coming out.  Frank Quilici pinch-ran for Killebrew in the ninth.  Bob Allison pinch-hit for Perranoski in the ninth.  Paul Ratliff pinch-ran for Holt in the ninth.

Rod Carew was 1-for-5 and was batting .393.  Oliva was batting .331.  Killebrew was batting .328.  Tovar was 1-for-4 and was batting .300.  Hall had an ERA of 2.66.  Williams had an ERA of 1.35.  Perranoski gave up a run in one inning and had an ERA of 1.65.

Mendoza was 0-for-1 and was batting .188.  Dave Boswell started and allowed five runs in 1.2 innings and had an ERA of 7.23.

This was the first triple of Mitterwald's career.  He ended with seven.  His season high was three in 1975.

Unless Holt was injured and couldn't run, I don't understand pinch-running Ratliff for him.  Ratliff ended his career with zero stolen bases.  In the minors he stole twelve in nine seasons.  I don't think Holt was exactly a speedster, but he moved well enough that the Twins routinely used him as a defensive replacement in the outfield.  It didn't matter, in the end, because the next batter struck out to end the game, but it seems like a really odd move.

The Angels used five relief pitchers.  That's routine today, but not very common in 1970.  Three of them were guys you probably never heard of:  Paul Doyle, Greg Garrett, and Kealey.  Doyle appeared in 87 major league games, 47 of them in 1970.  This was one of his five career wins.  Garrett appeared in 32 games, 30 of them in 1970.  Kealey had a longer career--he appeared in parts of six seasons, playing in 139 games.  This was his first career save--he ended with eleven.

California took two out of three from the Twins in Minnesota in this matchup of first and second place teams.

Record:  The Twins were 26-12, in first place in the American League West, a half game ahead of California.

Keeping Track

2003 Rewind: Game Forty

KANSAS CITY 9, MINNESOTA 5 IN MINNESOTA (14 INNINGS)

Date:  Thursday, May 15.

Batting stars:  Cristian Guzman was 4-for-7 with a triple.  Luis Rivas was 2-for-5 with two runs.  Corey Koskie was 2-for-5 with two walks.  A. J. Pierzynski was 2-for-6 with a triple.

Pitching stars:  Juan Rincon pitched a perfect inning.  LaTroy Hawkins pitched a scoreless inning, giving up a walk and striking out one.  Eddie Guardado pitched a perfect inning and struck out one.  Tony Fiore pitched a scoreless inning, giving up two hits.

Opposition stars:  Mike Defelice was 2-for-3 with a triple and a double.  Raul Ibanez was 2-for-7 with two runs.  Desi Relaford was 2-for-7 with a stolen base, his sixth.  Angel Berroa was 2-for-7.  Carlos Beltran was 1-for-4 with a home run (his fifth) and three walks.

The game:  Michael Tucker led off the game with a double and Beltran hit a one-out home run, putting the Royals up 2-0.  The Twins played catch-up the rest of the day.

They got on the board in the third on two-out walks to Doug Mientkiewicz and Koskie and an RBI single by Todd Sears.  Kansas City got the run back in the fourth when Ibanez singled, went to third on Ken Harvey's double, and scored on a sacrifice fly.  The Twins cut the margin to 3-2 in the fifth on singles by Rivas and Guzman and a sacrifice fly.  The tied it in the sixth when Torii Hunter singled and scored on Guzman's triple.

The Royals went back in front in the seventh.  Relaford led off with a single and scored on Defelice's triple.  A pair of walks loaded the bases with one out and a balk brought home a run to make it 5-3 Kansas City.  The Twins got out of the inning with no further damage and got one of the runs back in the bottom of the seventh when Guzman tripled and scored on a ground out.  With two out in the eighth Rivas and Guzman singled, Mientkiewicz walked to load the bases, and Koskie walked to bring in the tying run.  Denny Hocking struck out to leave the bases loaded. Neither team scored in the ninth, so we went to extra innings.

This was back when men were men, and we didn't have any ridiculous "start the inning with a man on second" nonsense.  The Royals put together a couple of threats.  A hit batsman and a walk put two on with two out in the ninth.  Defelice hit a one-out double in the eleventh.  The Twins had men on first and third with one out in the twelfth, but a double play ended the inning.  Kansas City had men on first and second with one out in the thirteenth.

The dam finally broke in the fourteenth.  Joe Randa led off with a double and Beltran walked.  Mike Sweeney singled to load the bases.  Raul Ibanez then singled home a run.  A sacrifice fly brought home a second, and RBI singles by Relaford and Berroa made it 9-5.  The Twins could not rally in the bottom of the inning.

WP:  D. J. Carrasco (3-1).  LP:  Johan Santana (2-1).  S:  None.

Notes:  Sears was again at first base and Mientkiewicz in right field.  Dustan Mohr was again in left in place of Jacque Jones.  Bobby Kielty was the DH.  It seems odd to me that Kielty, an outfielder, would be the DH while Mientkiewicz, a first baseman, was in right field.  It's hard to second-guess a decision like that when we're this far removed from it, though, and Gardy may have had a good reason for doing it this way.

Denny Hocking pinch-ran for Sears in the seventh and stayed in the game in right field, with Mientkiewicz going to first base.  Jones pinch-hit for Rivas in the twelfth.  Chris Gomez came in to play second base in the thirteenth.

Jones was 0-for-1 and was batting .338.  Hocking was 0-for-2 and was batting .087.

Kenny Rogers started for the Twins and pitched 6.1 innings, giving up five runs (four earned) on seven hits and a walk and striking out six.  J. C. Romero did not give up a run in two-thirds of an inning to make his ERA 3.38.  Rincon's ERA was 1.37.  Hawkins' ERA was 1.53.  Guardado's ERA was 1.72.  Johan Santana was charged with all four fourteenth-inning runs in his third inning of work, making his ERA 2.56.  Fiore lowered his ERA to 6.16.

Miguel Ascencio started for the Royals.  He pitched 5.1 innings, giving up three runs on five hits and three walks and striking out five.

Both starting catchers hit a triple in this game.  I don't know how often that's happened, but it certainly seems unusual.  Pierzynski had three triples in 2003 and twenty-four for his career.  It was Defelice's only triple of the season and one of nine he had in his career.

I had remembered Joe Randa as something of a Twins-killer, but he really wasn't.  His career numbers against them are .275/.315/.404, not terrible but nothing special, either.  Those are actually below his overall career numbers of .284/.339/.426.

The battle of the top two teams in the division was evenly split, so the Twins remained where they had been before the series.

Record:  The Twins were 22-18, in second place in the American League Central, 2.5 games behind Kansas City.