MINNESOTA 7, TAMPA BAY 3 IN TAMPA
Date: Tuesday, May 6.
Batting stars: Jacque Jones was 5-for-5 with two home runs (his second and third), a double, a stolen base (his fifth), and three runs. Dustan Mohr was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer, his fourth. Bobby Kielty was 2-for-4. Torii Hunter was 1-for-5 with a two-run homer, his fourth.
Pitching star: Brad Radke pitched seven innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and one walk and striking out six.
Opposition stars: Rey Ordonez was 2-for-4 with a double. Rocco Baldelli was 2-for-4 with a stolen base, his third. Nick Bierbrodt pitched three shutout innings, giving up three hits and striking out two. Jesus Colome struck out two in two shutout innings, giving up one hit.
The game: Jones led off the game with a home run, putting the Twins up 1-0. With one out in the second, Kielty singled and Mohr followed with a home run, giving the Twins a 3-0 lead. Jones led off the third with another home run. Later in the inning, with two out, Todd Sears walked and Hunter hit a two-run homer, leaving the Twins ahead 6-0.
After one in the first, two in the second, and three in the third, it would've been cool for the Twins to score four in the fourth, but they didn't. In fact, they didn't score again until the ninth. It didn't matter, though, as they already had all the runs they would need. The Devil Rays put two on in the first and again in the fourth, but did not score until the sixth. They started the inning with consecutive singles by Baldelli, Aubrey Huff, and Travis Lee, loading the bases with none out. All they could do, though, was score one run on a ground out and another on a sacrifice fly, only cutting the margin to 6-2.
Tampa Bay put two on again in the seventh, but a double play took them out of the inning. In the ninth Jones singled, stole second, and scored on a Corey Koskie single to increase the lead to 7-2. The Devil Rays got that run back when Chris Truby walked and scored from first on an Ordonez double, but that was all they could do and the Twins had the victory.
WP: Radke (3-3). LP: Steve Parris (0-3). S: None.
Notes: A. J. Pierzynski returned to the lineup behind the plate. Sears was at first base in place of Doug Mientkiewicz and Chris Gomez was at second in place of Luis Rivas. Kielty was the DH.
The Twins made no in-game lineup substitutions.
Jones raised his average to .336. Kielty was batting .310.
Radke lowered his ERA to 5.65, Johan Santana gave up a run on a hit and a walk in two innings, raising his ERA to 1.59.
Jones raised his average by 30 points with his 5-for-5 game. His slugging average went up 86 points, from .414 to .500.
Tampa Bay starter Parris pitched three innings, allowing six runs on six hits and a walk and striking out one. I don't really remember him, but he pitched in the majors for parts of eight seasons: two for Pittsburgh, three for Cincinnati, two for Toronto, and his last with the Devil Rays. He had a couple of good years for the Reds, going 6-5, 3.73, 1.22 WHIP in 1998 and 11-4, 3.50, 1.37 in 1999. He hadn't done much since, though, and by 2003 was at the end of the line. This was his last major league start--he would make three relief appearances. then was released and his playing career was over.
After losing eight out of nine, the Twins had now won six out of seven and were back over .500.
Record: The Twins were 16-15, in second place in the American League Central, 4.5 games behind Kansas City.