Tag Archives: pinch-runners

Keeping Track

1970 Rewind: Game Eighty-four

MINNESOTA 6, BALTIMORE 5 IN BALTIMORE (10 INNINGS)

Date:  Friday, July 17.

Batting stars:  Tom Tischinski was 2-for-2 with three walks and two runs.  Jim Holt was 2-for-3.  Rich Reese was 2-for-5 with a three-run homer, his seventh.  Harmon Killebrew was 2-for-5 with a home run (his twenty-eighth) and two runs.  Cesar Tovar was 2-for-5.

Pitching stars:  Jim Kaat pitched a scoreless inning, walking one and striking out one.  Ron Perranoski pitched three shutout innings, walking one and striking out one.

Opposition stars:  Mark Belanger was 3-for-5.  Elrod Hendricks was 2-for-4 with a home run, his sixth.  Paul Blair was 2-for-4 with a double and a walk.  Dave Johnson was 1-for-3 with a two-run homer (his seventh), two walks, two runs, and two RBIs.  Mike Cuellar pitched 6.2 innings, giving up three runs on six hits and three walks and striking out three.

The game:  The Orioles opened the first with a Don Buford single and a Blair double, putting men on second and third with none out, but only scored once on a ground out.  Each team threatened in the second but did not score.  The Twins loaded the bases in the fourth, the second time they had done so, but again did not score.  Baltimore loaded the bases in the bottom of the fourth on a walk to Johnson and singles by Hendricks and Belanger, but again only scored once on a ground out, leaving them up 2-0.  It went to 3-0 in the sixth when Hendricks homered.

The Twins came back in the seventh.  Tischinski and Tovar singled and Reese hit a two-out three-run homer to tie it 3-3.  The Orioles grabbed the lead right back in the bottom of the seventh when Frank Robinson was hit by a pitch and Johnson hit a two-run homer, making it 5-3.

Killebrew homered in the eighth to cut the lead to 5-4.  In the ninth, Tischinski walked, went to second on a passed ball, and scored on a Tovar single, tying the score 5-5.

Killebrew led off the tenth with a single.  With one out, Perranoski bunted and was safe on a fielder's choice, putting men on first and second.  With two out Tischinski delivered an RBI single to give the Twins their first lead of the game.  It was the only lead they needed, as Baltimore went down in order in the bottom of the tenth.

WP:  Perranoski (6-2).

LP:  Ed Watt (2-6).

S:  None.

Notes:  Charlie Manuel was in left field in place of Brant Alyea.  Jim Holt was in center, with Tovar moving to second base.  Tischinski was at catcher in place of George Mitterwald.

Paul Ratliff pinch-hit for Kaat in the seventh.  Danny Thompson pinch-hit for Manuel in the eighth and stayed in the game at second base, with Tovar moving to center field.  Alyea pinch-hit for Holt in the eighth.  Bob Allison went to left.  Frank Quilici went to second base in the tenth, with Thompson moving to third and Killebrew coming out of the game.

Tischinski was batting .375.  Killebrew was batting .326.  Tony Oliva was 0-for-5 and was batting .319.  Tovar was batting .314.  Bill Zepp gave up three runs in five innings and had an ERA of 2.80.  Stan Williams allowed two runs in an inning and had an ERA of 1.64.  Perranoski had an ERA of 1.55.

Manuel was 0-for-2 and was batting .150.  Allison was 0-for-2 and was batting .174.

Kaat was once again used in relief.  Someone in the starting rotation being used in relief on consecutive days is certainly not something you see very often.  He would go back to starting three days later and would not appear in relief again until September.

This was Tischinski's only multi-hit game of the season.  He raised his average from .167 to .375.

Oddly, Bill Rigney did not pinch-run for either Tischinski in the ninth, when he represented the tying run, or for Killebrew in the tenth, when he represented the go-ahead run.  Not pinch-running for Killebrew is understandable--it was a tie game, and you might need Harmon's bat if the game continued.  But not running for Tischinski in the ninth, when you needed to pull out all the stops to tie the game, seems strange.  Quilici was still on the bench, available for use, but he was not used.  Rigney got away with it, but it's hard to think it was the right thing to do.

Record:  The Twins were 55-29, in first place in the American League West, four games ahead of California.

 

Keeping Track

Random Rewind: 2000, Game Sixty-three

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MILWAUKEE 5, MINNESOTA 3 IN MINNESOTA

Date:  Sunday, June 11.

Batting stars:  Matt Lawton was 2-for-2 with a triple and three walks.  Denny Hocking was 2-for-4 with a double.  Midre Cummings was 2-for-4 with a double and a walk.

Pitching star:  LaTroy Hawkins pitched 1.1 scoreless innings, giving up one hit.

Opposition stars:  Geoff Jenkins was 3-for-5 with a double, two stolen bases (his second and third), and two RBIs.  Marquis Grissom was 2-for-4 with a home run (his third), a stolen base (his eleventh), a walk, three runs, and two RBIs.  Mark Sweeney was 2-for-4 with a walk.  Raul Casanova was 2-for-4.

The game:  Ronnie Belliard led off the game with a single and Grissom followed with a two-run homer, putting the Twins in a 2-0 hole two batters into the game.  The Twins got one back in the bottom of the first when Cristian Guzman drew a one-out walk and scored on Lawton's triple.  The Brewers had men on first and third with none out in the second and first and second with one out in the third, but were denied both times, leaving the score 2-1 through three.

The Twins took their first (and only) lead of the game in the fourth.  Cummings led off with a double but only made it as far as third with two out.  Hocking then got an RBI single to tie the score.  Singles by Jacque Jones and Guzman produced another run, and the Twins led 3-2.

The lead lasted until the next half-inning.  In the fifth, Grissom singled, stole second, went to third on a fly ball, and scored on a fielder's choice, tying it 3-3.  Charlie Hayes walked to put men on first and second and Sweeney had a run-scoring single to give Milwaukee a 4-3 advantage.

The Twins threatened in the sixth when Hocking led off with a double, but he could only get as far as third.  The Brewers added an insurance run in the seventh when Grissom reached on a two-base error and scored on a Jenkins single.  The Twins had one more threat in the ninth.  Lawton led off with a single, David Ortiz had a one-out single, and Cummings walked, loading the bases.  A hit would have tied the score, but Matthew LeCroy hit into a double play and the game was over.

WP:  John Snyder (1-2).  LP:  Brad Radke (3-8).  S:  Bob Wickman (7).

Notes:  Hocking was at second base in place of Jay Canizaro.  Jacque Jones was in center.  Torii Hunter played the most games in center, but he was sent down for a couple of months in the middle of the season after batting just .207.  He would hit very well the last couple of months and end at .280.  Lawton, who played quite a bit in both right and left, was in left in this game, with Cummings in right.

The only non-pitcher substitution was that Brian Buchanan pinch-ran for Ortiz in the ninth.  I understand that, if the game went extra innings, Buchanan was probably the best choice to replace Ortiz as DH.  I also don't have time to go back and look at who was on the roster in that game or what their health situation was.  But it's hard to believe the Twins didn't have a better pinch-running candidate than Buchanan, especially when he represented the tying run.  It didn't matter, as it turned out, but that still seems like a strange move.

Lawton was batting .346 at this stage of the season, and the Twins' front office was promoting him as a superstar.  Well, I guess they had to promote someone.  He would finish at .305, which of course is still very good.  Jones was batting .322.  He would finish at .285.  On the other end of the scale, LeCroy was batting .180.  He would finish at .174.

Catcher was pretty much a black hole for the Twins in 2000.  LeCroy and Marcus Jensen each caught 49 games, the most on the team.  Jensen batted just .209.  Chad Moeller caught 48 games.  He would go on to have a long career, but he batted just .211 in 2000.  Danny Ardoin caught 15 games and batted .125.  Finally, in August, A. J. Pierzynski came up and took over the catcher's job, batting .307.

Radke started, and as you can see he had trouble in the first inning.  He lasted six innings, giving up five runs (four earned) on ten hits and two walks and striking out three.  For his career, Radke had a 5.05 ERA in the first inning, compared to his overall ERA of 4.22.  In 2000 he went 12-16, 4.45.

I don't know how many times Geoff Jenkins stole two bases in the same game, but it can't be very many.  He had 32 stolen bases for his career.  2000 was the only season when he had more than five--he had 11 in this season.  It was 11-for-12, so he was picking his spots well.  For his career he was 32-for-46.

Record:  The Twins were 28-35, in fourth place in the American League Central, ten games behind Chicago.  They would finish 69-93, in fifth (last) place, 26 games behind Chicago.

The Brewers were 25-37, in fifth place in the National League Central, nine games behind St. Louis.  They would finish 73-89, in third place, 22 games behind St. Louis.