This game was very hot (if you happened to be in Texas) and very long (everywhere).
Indeed, the Twins and Rangers played three hours and 49 minutes of baseball in a 117-degree heat index, the Bomba-less Bomba Squad completing the franchise’s first four-game sweep of Texas (as you may have heard once or twice or 88 times) with a 6-3 win.
Marwin Gonzalez got the men from Minnesota on the scoreboard first with an opening-inning two-run double. Eddie Rosario sac-flied in another in the fourth, half an inning before Martin Perez’s shutout ended, Jeff Mathis singling home a pair.
Both starting pitchers were gone after five innings and triple-digit pitches (Lance Lynn 112, Pérez 100). Minnesota’s bullpen cracked first when Sam Dyson gave up a seventh-inning game-tying solo dinger to Shin-Soo Choo, but Texas followed suit the following half-inning, as Jorge Polanco said “pfui” to the Twins’ bases-loaded hitting woes by sending a two-out Emmanuel Clase cutter into the right-center gap for a three-run triple. (That’s eight hyphens in one sentence. Take that, grammarians.)
Sergio Romo pitched a scoreless eighth, helping himself with a superb barehanded play, and though the Rangers got the tying run to the plate in the ninth, Taylor Rogers struck out Rougned Odor to end the game… finally.
Additionally, Max Kepler left the game in the seventh inning with heat-related issues. Feel better soon, Max.
STUDS:
DUDS:
- Greg Gibson (appeared to call strikes with a Magic 8-Ball)
ROLL CALL:
COMMENT OF THE GAME:
Two questions
1. Have the Twins ever swept the Rangers in a 4 game series?
2. Do the Twins have any more games at the Rangers after today?
The broadcast today has not answered these questions.
Back home for Chicago. Let’s see the Bombas back in full for another Twins sweep.