Alternatively titled: In Which The Twins Get Off Their Butts And Start Winning Games Again, Thus Marking The Part Of The Season Where They Take Care Of Business Like The Professional Hitters They Are, And Also Who Does This Shane Bieber Think He Is, Anyway?
Let's see what this Smeltzer kid has when he's used as more of a conventional attack than a surprise one, eh?
Featured image courtesy of our division lead.
This is the Battle for the AL Central (lead)
Perhaps the biggest series of the season (so far)
....so...
Make or Break?
Do or Die?
Win or Go Home?
All or Nothing?
Sink or Swim?
Now or Never?
Put Up or Shut Up?
...or...
is it just, "one game at a time"?
we shall see!
Kyle Gibson
-v-
Mike Clevinger
It's getting annoying to have Cleveland continually nipping at our heels.
(0 votes, average: 0.00 out of 10)
Loading... In progress. Stewart holding down the fort so far. Mauer is still wonderful.
Day game. On faveboom (that's FB; i like the non-autocorrected version better).
The next in our new feature installation of GOSO game logs.
-or-
After the Twins deal Dozier and Lynn (and Mauer?), they go on a crazy run with house money but ultimately fall short after improbably winning their Wild Card game.
In any case, Jeremy Bieber is pitching.
Odorizzi vs. Bieber*
Shane Bieber is Cleveland's #3 prospect. The 23-year-old makes his MLB debut tonight.
After a bad outing in NY on April 23, Odorizzi has only 2 decisions, both W's, and the team is 3-3 in games he's started (all three L's were 1-run games ... shocker). He's still not generally giving them more than ~5 innings per start, but he's been quietly better, allowing no more than 3 earned runs in 5 of his past 6 starts.
I'm not going to talk about the offense, because there isn't any...
There's almost no chance the Twins can make the playoffs via the wild card ... they need to make up ground on the division leaders - tonight's opposition. At 22-29, the Twins currently have the 4th worst record in the AL.** Lucky for them, two of the three below them are in the Central Division.
*
**the NL has only 2 teams with fewer wins: the Marlins and Reds.
Sorry guys and gals, this has gotta be a quick one. Go team!
Looking forward to a good Game 7. Perhaps it will come down to the very last batter...
1991
Seriously thinking about heading to Wrigleyville to watch it...
(1 votes, average: 10.00 out of 10)Loading... Winners!
Facing the reigning Cy Young winner, Corey Kluber, the Twins swung early & often and their first five hits went: double (Mauer), double (Sano), homerun (Plouffe), double (Hunter), double (Rosario). These five players accounted for all eight of the hits for the Twins - Brian Dozier added a sacrifice fly and a BB, Herrrmaaann reached twice (BB & HBP) and Escobar also had a BB.
Eddie further celebrated his 24th Birthday with a couple of singles, going 3-4. Despite 114 K's to only 14 BB's, Rosario's had a very nice rookie year: .270/.290/.463 with 18 Doubles, 15 Triples, 12 Homeruns, 49 RBI's, 56 Runs and 11 Stolen bases.
Tommy Milone, tapped to start in place of an ill Phil Hughes a mere four hours before the game, rebounded nicely from his previous two starts at the beginning of September (the results of which - combined with Hughes' return from the DL and Duffy's effectiveness - caused a move to the bullpen). He gave Molitor & Co. 5 2/3 quality innings, allowing only two earned runs on four hits, no walks and four strikeouts. In the sixth, Kipnis blasted a fly ball to deep centerfield that it appeared Hicks had a play on. Instead, he leapt & missed it and the ball caromed off the wall, allowing Kipnis to reach third base. The Indian's rookie SS phenom, Francisco Lindor, then added his second RBI of the night (first was a 1st inning HR) by grounding out to SS. That was all they'd get as the Twins bullpen went on to shut the Cleveland lineup down. Boyer, Fien, Perkins & Jepsen pitched 3 1/3 innings of shutout baseball, allowing only two hits and striking out three (two by Perk-n-Play - yay!).
With this win, the Twins have guaranteed themselves the first .500 or better season in five years. Considering I couldn't find any/we didn't do any predictions this year, I'd say none of us expected much from this club to begin the season. That they're still in the playoff hunt with six games to play is a minor miracle.
For Funzies:
2014 Predictions
2013 Predictions
