August 2, 2019

Newly acquired Sam Dyson makes disastrous appearance for Twins

In one of the worst losses of the season, the Miami Marlins, a team that is 23 games under .500, 21 games out of the running in its own division and has the lowest attendance in the National League, rallied to tie the Twins in the ninth inning and beat them in extras on a walk-off home run to win 5-4 on Thursday. So much for the sweep.

Luckily, the Cleveland Indians lost again as well so the Twins’ lead in the AL Central still stands at three games.

All went according to plan for most of the game. Michael Pineda gave the Twins a quality start, relievers Tyler Duffey and Sergio Romo made scoreless appearances, and then it all went to hell when newly acquired reliever Sam Dyson served up three runs, which allowed the Fish to tie the game at 4-4.

Dyson couldn’t get an out in the inning. He gave up three runs on two hits, including a double, and also walked two batters. Ace lefty Taylor Rogers spelled Dyson and got hung with the blown save because of inherited runners. Rogers gave up one hit, but the runs that scored were all charged to Dyson. Rogers then struck out the side to send it to extra innings.

In the 12th, Twins rookie reliever, Cody Stashak, who looked so impressive against the New York Yankees and who hasn’t looked as impressive since, served up the walk-off blast. And that was all she wrote, folks.

“Didn’t execute, didn’t get the job done,” Dyson told MLB.com after the game. “We had the lead. I didn’t do my job as part of the team. That’s a bad first impression. Hopefully there’s no more of those.”

Now, the Twins go home for 10 games against the Kansas City Royals, the Atlanta Braves and four, huge games against the Tribe. Buckle up, Twins fans. Martin Perez gets the ball Friday.

Extra innings…

-Max Kepler hit his 30th home run and Byron Buxton his 30th double in Thursday’s game.

-Some twitter reaction to Dyson’s night:

COMMENTS

Hi, I’m Rolf Boone, Twins fan.

I became a fan of the Minnesota Twins after a friendly wager in the early 1980s. I survived Ron Davis, the meltdown in Cleveland, Phil Bradley at the Kingdome and then marveled at a rising generation of stars and two World Series wins in 1987 and 1991. Brad Radke made the 1990s bearable, while Kirby Puckett’s eye injury, exit from the game and eventual death made it almost too much to bear. The new century ushered in more talent — Joe Mauer, Johan Santana, Joe Nathan, Torii Hunter, Justin Morneau — and consecutive seasons of playoff baseball, followed by consecutive seasons of losing baseball. A winning season returned in 2015. So here we are. Go Twins.