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Ever so briefly, the Cleveland Indians overtook the American League Central. Following their triumphant series at Target Field, which moved them into a first-place tie, the Indians defeated the Red Sox on Monday to pull ahead of Minnesota in the standings.

By week's end, the hot-hitting Twins had moved back into the lead with a bit of breathing room, and they're poised to keep adding in the days ahead.

The Twins stayed as hot as the scorching weather today as they completed the sweep over the Texas Rangers. Martin Perez made his second straight good start and a huge triple from Jorge Polanco led the Twins to the 6-3 win. The division lead remains at 2.5 games and the Twins will host Chicago next.

In his last appearance as a AA-Pensacola Blue Wahoo, Twins #3 prospect Brusdar Graterol hit 103.8 MPH on a pitch and then was promoted to AAA-Rochester along with fellow fireballer Jorge Alcala. The move aligns with recent news that Graterol could be promotedto the Twins bullpen for their postseason run.

In a season full of pleasant surprises for the Minnesota Twins, there are perhaps none more so than the play of third-year catcher Mitch Garver. After being thrust into a bigger role than expected in 2018 thanks to Jason Castro going down with a season-ending knee injury, Garver has settled back in this season, splitting time, almost 50/50, with Castro. As a result, the Twins have been able to keep Garver fresh, and leverage him in the best way possible, to maximize his abilities. Among the 29 catchers with at least 250 plate appearances this season, Garver’s 140 wRC+ is in a distant first place. This is helped, in large part, by the 23 home runs he has belted, which is second among all MLB catchers. However, Garver’s improvement at the plate isn’t the only step forward he has taken this year, as he has improved dramatically behind the plate, as well.

Last night’s 12-7 win over the Rangers featured six runs before the Rangers got an at-bat, home runs by C.J.Cron and Miguel Sano, another solid relief outing by Trevor May and even two home runs from #OldFriend Danny Santana. But the inadvertent highlight of the game happened during the seventh inning stretch, and #MNTwins twitter was THERE for it.

After the Minnesota Twins took the first two games of the series, on Thursday and Friday night, they were looking to clinch the series win on Saturday, against the Texas Rangers. Despite yet another poor outing from Jose Berrios, the Twins were able to do just that, defeating Texas 12-7 thanks to yet another great offensive outburst from the lineup. With the New York Yankees taking care of business against the Cleveland Indians earlier today, the Twins lead, in the American League Central, is back up to 2.5 games.

Hey, look at that, a bad pun, love it. Anyways, there was a number of great performances from a number of bullpens, a great start from a typical starter, and a number of rehabbing MLB players. All that and more in this edition of the minor league report.

Rocco Baldelli has been great. That’s indisputable. The Twins are still on pace to win the most games since 1970 and maybe win the division for the first time in nine years. I don’t believe many Twins fans are anything but satisfied with that. But recent struggles may have disappointed a number of fans. So we put together a letter to future Rocco, to help him avoid his rookie managing season mistakes.

There was a scoring decision last night that was at least odd and probably just plain incorrect. In the Twins 4-3 win over the Rangers, Sam Dyson was ruled the winning pitcher, despite taking the mound after the Twins took the lead. There are reasons to do that in baseball, but none seem to apply here.

First, let’s go through what happened.

When the Minnesota Twins claimed Ehire Adrianza off waivers prior to the start of the 2017 season, Twins fans could be excused for not being overly excited. The team was coming off a 59-win season and Adrianza was a light-hitting, glove-first shortstop who hit just .220/.292/.313 in parts of four seasons with the San Francisco Giants. Sure, Eduardo Escobar had had a terrible season as the Twin’s primary shortstop hitting .236/.280/.338, but Twins fans got an extended glimpse of the future with Jorge Polanco batting .282/.332/.424 in 69 games. With Miguel Sano, Polanco, Brian Dozier, and Joe Mauer covering the infield and Escobar as the utility man, Adrianza served as an emergency depth piece.

It wasn’t an easy one, but the Twins managed to defeat All-Star lefty Mike Minor and the Rangers in the second game of the series in Arlington, 4-3. Jonathan Schoop hit a clutch game-winning two-run dinger and the bullpen combined to throw 3 1/3 innings of shutout ball.

Willians Astudillo has been in Pensacola for two games. He’s homered in both of them. La Tortuga hit a bomba, Wander Javier had a four-hit night, Bailey Ober impressed in his Double-A debut and Matt Canterino had the most impressive outing of his young career. Come check out what else happened across the system Friday.