Well, gang, it looks like the day of the week doesn’t have any effect on things. No matter when I cover the game, the Twins WILL lose. That’s the Twinkie Town guarantee. They did it again on Sunday afternoon, dropping the series finale to the Arizona Diamondbacks by a final of 6-4, handing Bailey Ober his 8th loss of the season and bringing the Snakes back even at 75-75.
For Ober, it was the home run bug yet again, with a 3-run, fourth-inning blast off the bat of James McCann swinging the score from
a 2-1 Twins lead to a 4-2 Arizona advantage. The Minnesota runs had come in the home second, and featured an RBI single from Edouard Julien, a run-scoring reached-on-error from Byron Buxton grounder, and even a steal of second by Royce Lewis.
Ober still made it through six innings — his tenth time this year doing so — and struck out nine D-Backs without walking any.
On the flip side, Arizona used five pitchers to clean this game up; Minnesota would score off their first bullpen arm in the sixth (Matt Wallner’s 22nd homer of the year, called by Justin Morneau seconds before it happened), and a seventh-inning Mickey Gasper homer — his second ever.
But Arizona, hanging on the cliffside of postseason eligibility, kept winning on the margins today. They’d add insurance runs on a Tim Tawa RBI single and Alek Thomas sacrifice fly – runs charged to Genesis Cabrera and Michael Tonkin – to push their lead to 5-3 and eventually 6-4, the final.
Carson McCusker got another pinch-hitting opportunity, and grounded out.
Byron Buxton went 0-for-5 with a pair of Ks, and was largely quiet in the last two games of the series.
The Twins are back at it tomorrow, and more playoff hopefuls are coming into town. There may yet be more on the line for the New York Yankees, who have three games at Target Field with their own Wild Card spot hanging in the balance.
Enjoy the rest of the weekend!
STUDS:
C Mickey Gasper (1-for-3, 2 R, RBI, HR)
DUDS:
CF Byron Buxton (0-for-5, 2 K)
The Pohlad Family