MINNESOTA 4, CLEVELAND 2 IN CLEVELAND (10 INNINGS)
Date: Sunday, June 16.
Batting stars: Gene Larkin was 3-for-5 with a double. Kirby Puckett was 2-for-5 with a home run (his eighth) and two runs. Brian Harper was 2-for-5 with a double.
Pitching stars: Kevin Tapani pitched seven innings, giving up an unearned run on four hits and no walks and striking out three. Rick Aguilera pitched three innings, giving up one run on three hits and three walks.
Opposition stars: Greg Swindell pitched eight innings, giving up two runs on six hits and two walks and striking out three. Mike Aldrete was 2-for-3 with a walk. Felix Fermin was 2-for-5.
The game: Harper hit a one-out double in the second and went to third on Larkin's two-out single, but the Twins did not score. There was no other threat until the fourth, when Fermin led off with a single and scored on a single-plus-error by Aldrete.
In the fifth, Shane Mack led off with a walk, Larkin singled, and Scott Leius reached on a sacrifice bunt/error, loading the bases with none out. But a strikeout, a foul out, and a fly out followed, keeping the Twins off the board. The Twins finally broke through in the sixth, however, as Puckett led off with a home run to tie the score 1-1.
The Twins took the lead in the seventh. Larkin led off with a double and was still on second with two out, but Al Newman came through with an RBI single to make it 2-1 Minnesota. Aguilera came in to start the eighth, despite the fact that Tapani had retired twelve of the last thirteen batters and had thrown just 82 pitches. He walked Carlos Baerga and gave up one-out singles to Alex Cole and Fermin to tie the score 2-2.
Not to worry, In the tenth, Newman drew a one-out walk and Puckett followed with a single, putting men on first and third. Chili Davis hit a sacrifice fly to put the Twins in front and Harper had an RBI single for an insurance run. Mark Lewis drew a leadoff walk in the bottom of the tenth, but a double play followed and the win was secured.
WP: Aguilera (2-2). LP: Shawn Hillegas (2-1). S: None.
Notes: Newman was at second base, replacing Chuck Knoblauch. He batted second despite having an OBP of .279 and an OPS of .488. He went 1-for-4 with a walk, a run, and an RBI, so maybe Tom Kelly was right to bat him there. Or maybe he just got lucky.
Gene Larkin was at first base in place of Kent Hrbek. That was probably just to give Hrbek a day off, but again, it worked very well.
Pedro Munoz pinch-ran for Harper in the tenth inning. Munoz stayed in the game in right field, with Mack moving to center and Junior Ortiz coming in to catch and batting in Puckett's spot. It's interesting that Kelly apparently thought the better defense was with Mack in center and Munoz in right, rather than just substituting Ortiz in Harper's spot and leaving Puckett and Mack in center and right, respectively.
It's also interesting that Kelly removed Tapani after just seven innings and 82 pitches, and even more interesting that he brought in Aguilera for what at best would be a two-inning save. Aguilera had not pitched since June 11, when he was at the end of a streak in which he had pitched in seven of eight games. Tapani would not miss a start, so I assume he was not injured. There may have been a good reason for doing that, but I don't know what it was.
We previously went through Felix Fermin's struggles as a batter. Minnesota Twins fans, however, could've been forgiven for thinking he was an all-star. Against the Twins that year, he batted .378/.452/.405. For his career against the Twins, he batted .344/.393/.439. Again, his career batting numbers were .259/.305/.303 and in 1991 he batted .262/.307/.302.
The Twins had now won fifteen in a row and eighteen of nineteen. The first two wins were against Kansas City. They had swept Baltimore, Cleveland, the Yankees, and Cleveland again. None of those teams were very good, but it's not easy to win fifteen in a row against anybody. The winning streak had carried them from sixth place to first place. They would next travel to Baltimore. Could they keep the streak going?
Record: The Twins were 38-25, in first place in the American League West, a half game ahead of Oakland.