Bailey Ober made one mistake on Monday, but he settled down from there to give the Twins seven strong innings, the offense backed him with efficient hitting and the bullpen was perfect to take Game 1 against the Philadelphia Phillies, one of the best teams in baseball.
The mistake was serving up an early two-run home run to Bryce Harper, but that was the extent of the damage as Ober turned in a quality start and improved to 9-5 with an ERA just a nudge over 4.00.
At the plate the Twins banged out 12 hits, but more important they went 5-for-15 at the plate, which isn’t going to set any records, but it sure is better than the 3-for-26 performance they turned in over the weekend in two losses to the Brewers.
Simeon Woods Richardson gets the ball Tuesday.
Extra innings…
-A Twins win and Cleveland Guardians loss on Monday means the Twins are now only four games back of the Guards in the division.
-The Twins made life miserable for Phillies reliever Yunior Marte, who issued three walks in the eighth inning and also uncorked a wild pitch to hand the club three more runs in the 7-2 win.
-Monday’s game was delayed 90 minutes by rain.
-A little history: On July 23, 1960, the Washington Senators turned an all-Cuban triple play — Pedro Ramos to Julio Becquer to Jose Valdivelso — in an 8-3 win over the Kansas City Athletics.
Who had hits for the Senators? Some familiar names: Billy Gardner, Harmon Killebrew (who homered), Earl Battey and Becquer.
The (Washington, D.C.) Evening Star on the win:
“The Senators made the second triple play of the major league season yesterday at Griffith Stadium enroute to an 8-3 victory over Kansas City in a contest otherwise enlivened by Harmon Killebrew’s ninth home run and another wrangle with Umpire Bill McKinley.”
The 1960 Senators, a year away from moving to Minnesota, ended the season at 73-81 to mark their best finish in years. They had winning months in June, July and August, then slumped to 9-16 in September, which included a seven-game losing streak. They were pushovers no more: They won 10 of 22 meetings against the New York Yankees and were 15-7 versus the A’s.
Source: MLB.com, Baseball-Reference.com, Newspapers.com