Hard-hitting Guardians top feeble Twins offense
Have the Twins considered hitting some home runs?
Is anyone else sick of these weak, slap-hitting teams like the Twins thinking they can win in today’s game? I couldn’t imagine rooting for a team like that. Anyway — the large, powerful, and stronk Cleveland Guardians defeated the puny, weak Twins, 4-2, to at least give them a shot at splitting the four-game series with a win tomorrow.
After dropping the first two games — one in heartbreaking fashion, the other in an all-too-familiar 1-0 loss — Cleveland came out with some hard hits today. Logan Allen was solid on the mound, but it was a rare power display from Will Brennan and Steven Kwan that ultimately lifted them to the intradivision win.
Even outside of the home runs, Cleveland batters were all over the hard-hit leaderboard tonight. Minnesota’s Royce Lewis (who is going to be an ongoing problem for the Guardians) led the entire game with a 108.5-mph single, but six of the next seven batters were Guards, and all but two were hits. Tyler Freeman, who was only in the game to replace an injured Amed Rosario, led the way with a 107.4-mph single of his own. Before Rosario left with knee soreness, he didn’t trail far behind at 107.2 mph — albeit on a bad-luck lineout in the first inning.
How about Andrés Giménez clocking in at 104.7 mph with a double in the fourth, one of three hits on the day? Although he was blanked in four plate appearances yesterday, Giménez has multiple hits in three of his last six games, and dare I say he is starting to look like the same hitter last year that earned him a big payday in the offseason.
Gabriel Arias, Myles Straw, and Steven Kwan all had multi-hit days along with Giménez. Kwan also added an insurance run in the top of the ninth, his second of the season. Joining Kwan in the dinger party was Will Brennan, whose two-run shot in the third gave the Guardians a lead they never gave back.
Logan Allen may not have reached double-digit strikeout totals this time around, but he did hold the Twins to just two earned runs off of seven hits in six innings. He was perhaps a little more predictable in his pitch selection this time around, turning to his four-seamer 43 times, changeup 26 times, sweeper 20 times, and cutter six times. Seven of the nine times he found himself in an 0-2 count he turned to that changeup, and almost every time he fell behind in the count it was straight to the four-seamer and little else.
Still, it’s hard to be upset about a quality start from a rookie pitcher any time, anywhere. Let alone against a division rival that proved they could drop seven runs less than 48 hours ago.
The Guardians bullpen, which has been shaky as all hell this year, turned in a scoreless three innings of relief. James Karinchak held down a clean seventh inning with a pair of strikeouts, Enyel De Los Santos casually touched 98 on the radar gun in his frame, and Emmanuel Clase finally looked dominant again with his cutter in the ninth.