The Twins made it back-to-back wins over the Washington Nationals to take the series from the Nats and distance themselves from a seven-game losing streak with a 3-2 win on Wednesday.
The Twins took a 3-1 lead into the ninth inning, but once again closer Jhoan Duran had fans chomping on their nails to the quick after he served up yet another late-in-the game dinger. Still, he got out of the inning with a strike out and his fourth save.
At the plate, Max Kepler homered and doubled and Carlos Correa added a solo shot. Starter Simeon Woods Richardson pitched four-plus shutout innings (and it wasn’t entirely clear to me why he was pulled after 77 pitches) but did not figure in the decision. The win went to reliever Steven Okert, who arrived in style and tipped his driver.
The Twins are 26-23 and now head back to Target Field for a seven-game home stand. Seems to me like this would be a great time to make up some ground in the division. They are 6.5 games back of the Cleveland Guardians.
Bailey Ober gets the ball Friday.
Extra innings…
-Lead radio voice Kris Atteberry was in fine form during the Twins visit to Washington, and it’s clear he delights in riffing on pop-cultural and historical references whenever he’s calling a game. However, I think he lost his radio partner and ex-Twin Glen Perkins when he zeroed in on Nats player Joey Meneses and then began to compare his name to the Civil War battles at Manassas and Bull Run. I could picture Perkins with a thought bubble over his head, asking, “Where are we going with this, Kris?”
Still, if he lost listeners on Meneses/Manassas, he came right back with a great Max Kepler home run call on Wednesday.
Atteberry: “And in the words, to steal a phrase of a noted Minnesota philosopher, ‘Bring ya ass home, Max Kepler.’ It’s one nothing, Twins.”
Perkins: “Yeah!”
-Listening to the game made me wonder if the Twins had ever played the Montreal Expos, the forerunner of the Nats who played their final season in 2004. The Twins swept ’em that season 8-2, 5-4 and 6-4 at Stade Olympique, June 15-17.
“I feel for the people here,” Twins manager Ron Gardenhire told the Star Tribune after the 8-2 win. “There’s good history here. When I played back in the early 1980s, there were people here. I feel bad. I always enjoyed coming here. It’s a great city. You came here in the ’80s — life! Full of life.”
Sources: Baseball-Reference.com, Newspapers.com