Telling the schoolyard bully to shove it with a 4-2 win seems pretty sweet to me.
And that’s exactly what happened to the Twins on Saturday as the “bully” emerged in the form of the Boston Red Sox’s Wilson Contreras.
Wilson knocked over Kody Clemens with a head-first slide into first base, then appeared to go out of his way to crash into catcher Victor Caratini at home, but Vic wasn’t having any of that and immediately got into his face, which prompted a scrum between both teams near home plate.
The Twins held a 2-1 lead at the time, but after the near dustup they tacked on two more runs in the top of the 5th inning by loading the bases, followed by a Caratini sac fly and an Orlando Arcia single. Contributing to the bases-loaded situation was a Contreras error.
That’s called Karma, dude.
Things got dicey in the bottom of the 9th inning as rookie closer Andrew Morris walked the bases loaded, then forced in a run, but he still managed to secure two outs before manager Derek Shelton called on veteran reliever Taylor Rogers to close out the game. Rogers fanned Jarren Duran to end it.
The Twins go for the sweep on Sunday. Bailey Ober gets the ball.
Extra innings…
–The Twins radio crew used some choice words to describe Contreras on Saturday. Kris Atteberry referred to him as “obnoxious” and during the post-game show former Twins reliever and current member of the commentariat Glen Perkins said he would’ve “put one in his ribs.” That’s the correct answer, Perk. Thank you.
–The Big Bopper on Saturday was Oregon State man Trevor Larnach who had a 4-for-5 day at the plate, including a double, with two runs scored.
–Although Morris struggled, the pitching was otherwise pretty stellar. Starter Taj Bradley, fresh off the injured list, fanned seven across five innings with one run allowed to improve to 5-1 with a 2.77 ERA. Nobody saw this coming. And then Kendry Rojas gave the Twins three scoreless innings with three strikeouts.
–Royce Lewis has hit three home runs in as many days since his demotion to Triple-A St. Paul. I guess he won’t be there for long.
–Saturday’s win means the Twins have won the season series over Boston for the first time since 2006, according to comments made by Atteberry during the game.
Twenty years ago the Twins finished 5-1 against the Sox that season. Their first win came on June 13, a 5-2 win in extra innings that featured a Jason Kubel walk-off grand slam. Before that, though, they ran into a buzzsaw in the form of Johan Santana.
The Boston Globe was there:
“I knew from jump street he was on,” (Boston pitcher Curt) Schilling later said. “I knew he was going to have to make one mistake for us to win.”
Santana, for eight spellbinding innings, was channeling Randy Johnson, amassing 13 strikeouts, the highest total by a lefthander against the Sox since 1972 with the exception of that man. Mickey Lolich, in 1972, fanned 15 Red Sox, and Johnson matched that in 1998. Santana walked no one and found the plate with 75 of his 102 pitches.
Source: Newspapers.com