CLEVELAND 5, MINNESOTA 0 IN MINNESOTA (14 INNINGS)
Date: Wednesday, August 13.
Batting star: Jacque Jones was 2-for-4.
Pitching stars: Johan Santana struck out eight in eight shutout innings, giving up four hits and a walk. LaTroy Hawkins struck out four in two shutout innings, giving up one hit. Eddie Guardado pitched two perfect innings, striking out one.
Opposition stars: Jason Davis struck out six in six shutout innings, giving up two hits and two walks. Rafael Betancourt struck out two in two shutout innings, giving up a hit and a walk. Terry Mulholland pitched four shutout innings, giving up two hits and striking out two. Ben Broussard was 3-for-5 with a double and a stolen base, his fourth. Jhonny Peralta was 2-for-5 with a walk and a stolen base. Jody Gerut was 2-for-6.
The game: This is what you would call a pitchers' duel. Neither team even put two men on base until the seventh, when the Twins got two-out singles from Jones and Torii Hunter. Neither team got a man to third until the eighth, when Michael Ryan doubled and went to third when Cristian Guzman reached on an error. That was the closest the Twins came to scoring: they had men on first and third with none out. But Shannon Stewart grounded out, Luis Rivas hit into a fielder's choice with Ryan thrown out at the plate, and Corey Koskie grounded out.
It remained scoreless until the fourteenth, when it all fell apart for the Twins. Juan Rincon was in his second inning of work. He gave up consecutive singles to Casey Blake, Gerut, and Ryan Ludwick, with the last one bringing home the first run of the game. J. C. Romero came in. A bunt moved the runners up, Tim Laker was intentionally walked, Travis Hafner was hit by a pitch to bring in a run, Peralta singled home two, and a ground out brought home the fifth run. The Twins got a leadoff walk in the bottom of the fourteenth, but that was all.
WP: Mulholland (2-2). LP: Rincon (3-5). S: None.
Notes: Stewart was again in left, with Dustan Mohr in right and Jones at DH. Ryan pinch-hit for Mohr in the eighth, with MIchael Restovich going to right field. Denny Hocking pinch-ran for Jones in the ninth.
Ryan had his second consecutive pinch-hit hit and was batting 1.000. Stewart was 1-for-6 and was batting .317. Jones was batting .307. Koskie was 1-for-5 and was batting .301.
Santana lowered his ERA to 2.96. His game score of 81 was his best of the season. He now had back-to-back eight-inning starts without giving up an earned run. It's almost like they should've put him in the rotation sooner or something.
Hawkins lowered his ERA to 2.25.
By games scores, this was tied for Jason Davis' best game of the season. He equaled his score of 72 of June 18, when he allowed one run in a complete game against Detroit. For the season, he would go 8-11, 4.68, 1.33 WHIP. It was the best season of his career, although he did have a decent year pitching out of the bullpen for the Indians in 2006. For his career, he was 22-26, 4.82, 1.52 WHIP in 461 innings. He appeared in 144 games, 56 of them starts.
After winning four in a row, the Twins had now dropped two straight and were falling back toward .500.
Record: The Twins were 61-59, in third place in the American League Central, 3.5 games behind Kansas City. They were two games behind second-place Chicago.