MIN 4, CHW 0: Mauer Reaches 2,000 Hits, Leads Twins to Victory
Apr 12 2018 09:19 PM |
Tom Froemming
in Minnesota Twins
Image courtesy of Brad Rempel-USA TODAY Sports
Snapshot (chart via FanGraphs)
Of course, in order to get to 2,000 Mauer had to get 1,999. He delivered an RBI single in the third inning and also walked in the first.
Mauer has been one of the best hitters in baseball so far in this young season. He closed the night with a .412 batting average and 1.074 OPS.
Berrios was incredible. He tied a career high with 11 strikeouts and did not walk a batter over seven shutout innings. Of his 99 pitches, 73 were for strikes. On the season, Jose has 24 strikeouts, one walk and an ERA of 2.18. Wow.
He’s on quite a roll heading into the Puerto Rico series.
According to Baseball Savant, Berrios racked up 17 swinging strikes tonight, 11 of them on the 37 curveballs he threw. That pitch is developing into one of the more formidable offerings in baseball.
Brian Dozier had an RBI double and scored twice. He has a hit in every game so far this season. Miguel Sano and Eddie Rosario also doubled. Byron Buxton stole a pair of bases, giving him four on the year already. He didn't swipe his fourth base until May 18 last season.
Bullpen Usage
Here’s a quick look at the number of pitches thrown by the bullpen over the past five days:
Next Three Games
Fri vs. CHW 7:10 pm CT
Sat vs. CHW 1:10 pm CT
Sun vs. CHW 1:10 pm CT
Last Three Games
MIN 9, HOU 8: Max to the Rescue!
MIN 4, HOU 1: Odorizzi, Twins Battle Their Way to Victory
HOU 2, MIN 0: Failure to Launch
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29 Comments
Mauer's not flipping around this year, darn it. In fact, he was at batting practice, and the batboy asked him which bat was his, and Mauer finished dipping his French fry in mayonnaise, and then said, "It's the one that says Bad Mauer Flipper on it."
Mauer's a stud, and that is not fiction of any kind.
Berrios is a stud too. A stud muffin even.
Pressly is gaining my confidence, and Moya has it. I'll be bummed if he gets shipped out tonight.
Deserved kudos to Joe, but I can't resist saying that the starting pitcher was absolutely ... Berrilliant! The White Sox have to be saying "Do we really have to play against this guy for 4+ more years?"
On pace for 113 wins.Nice job Twins.Congrats Joe.
Berrios!
I could only watch the condensed game (damn those are nice btw hope mlb.com runs them all year), Berrios looked like he was eating people alive with the curve.That is a +++ pitch when he has it going and makes his fastball a real danger as well.
Congratz Mr. Mauer, its a shame injuries made it take this long but thats a hell of a milestone.
Oh hey, look who is leading the league in fWAR for all pitchers: https://www.fangraph...son1=2018&ind=0
Gracias, fixed. I had seven on the mind last night, so I shorted him four Ks. Either that or I ran out of fingers and toes
I wish I could have watched this one. Nothing quite like seeing a 4-0 box score. Means every side of the team was working well.
Hope this Mauer torrid streak continues.
Only real thing I want to see is Sano and Buxton cutting down on the Ks. I know Sano's OPS looks good, but I really don't think either have really taken off yet.
It is nice that Joe's 2000th hit was one that mattered on a team that has some hope rather than a meaningless hit in a game we were sure to lose and in one of the dark seasons.Also nice that it was at a time that he finished the night leading the league in batting average and batting over 400.Not that the 400 is sustainable (although that would be nice).
Buxton has really been cutting down on the K's. He's struck out just twice in his last 18 at-bats.
Sano on the other hand....P.U.He is hammering the ball when he makes contact, though. And at this point Logan Morrison has been so terrible that moving Sano in the batting order isn't realistic.
That was fun to watch. Mauer's having a nice late career run here these last two seasons. That's probably enough to get him in the HOF.
Berrios has really looked good since last year. Let's just keep that going.
Not worried about Sano and Buxton, they'll get there.
Although I'd be curious to see how many HOURS Mauer has spent on base over his career. New stat to track???
Replay / review aided the Twins as well.Without that, Buxton is caught stealing and the Twins likely do not score the 2 runs in the 3rd.That made it a different ballgame.
You're right, and Buxton had a huge impact on the bases that inning. Singled, stole second, advanced to third on a fly out to the center fielder and then scored on a groundball hit to the shortstop while the infield was drawn in.
A very small percentage of players would have been able to make all that happen. The White Sox made some poor throws that allowed him to get to third and then home, but it definitely seemed like they were feeling the pressure of Buxton on the bases.
On replay, I still can't believe it took them over three and a half minutes to review that Berrios-Anderson pickoff and they still got it wrong.
It is too bad they probably won't be able to build on this momentum and take a few more from the Sox since the weather gods show they do not care about the Twins and their home stand.Hopefully winter will be over by the All-Star break.
Tonight's game cancelled, ya think?
I think they are predicting tonight and tomorrow almost sure to be cancelled and a strong chance for Sunday as well.