Twins 2, Guardians 0: Max Kepler Homer, Bailey Ober Dominance Lead Twins to Victory

[Matt Braun]

Sometimes all you need is one knock.

Image courtesy of © David Richard-USA TODAY Sports

Box Score
Bailey Ober: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 6 K
Home Run: Max Kepler (4)
Top 3 WPA: Bailey Ober (.427), Max Kepler (.226), Jhoan Duran (.087)
Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

  If you successfully navigated the complex superhighway of streaming services, or perhaps sheepishly asked one of your younger, hipper relatives to assist you in the journey, then the Twins vs Guardians on Apple TV+ awaited you as your award. Well-protected and shielded by valuable paywall, the resulting content, the 18-14 Twins—led by Bailey Ober—taking on the 14-17 Guardians—led by Peyton Battenfield—proved a surprisingly wise selection. 

It was a pitcher’s duel, nearly completely barren of offensive ability for the first five frames as Ober and Battenfield served zeroes. A 4th-inning Josh Naylor double was the only hit for awhile; Battenfield’s no-hitter bid reached the 6th.

Ober’s success was not altogether shocking, but for Battenfield—a rookie making his 4th career start—the outing was magnificent. His cutter deftly alluded Minnesota’s bats, leading to whiffs and weak contact as the Twins could not understand Battenfield’s movement; many batters walked back to the dugout in confusion.

But fortune changed quickly. After Christian Vázquez singled to break Battenfield’s perfect game, Max Kepler worked a full count, sat on one of those aforementioned cutters, and blasted the pitch 440 feet out to right field, suddenly catapulting the Twins ahead with a 2-0 advantage.

This author’s loud father would like the people of Twins Daily to know that he predicted the homer. He was insufferable. 

With renewed vigor, and a lead for once, Ober continued his mission to mow down the Guardians. José Ramírez singled to apply some pressure, but two straight outs neutered his hit. With Ramírez on second, Oscar Gonzalez shot a grounder off the plate, sending a high, lazy fly ball to the pitcher’s mound; Ober needed to make a play. He did, catching the ball and firing to Donovan Solano off his back foot with not enough juice to catch Gonzalez. Ramírez—sensing an opportunity—scrambled home to try and score Cleveland’s first run, but Solano—quick-witted and aware—fired a throw to Vázquez, and nailed the runner at the plate.

And so Ober’s night came to a close. The results were astounding: 7 innings, 3 hits, 0 earned runs, 1 walks, and 6 strikeouts constituted one of the finest starts of his career; Minnesota will need more of that going forward as they look to patch their rotation following two critical injuries. 

Jorge López worked a breezy 8th inning to set up Jhoan Duran in the 9th.

With maybe a desire for some drama, or because of elusive command, Duran kept the game interesting. A lead-off walk of Steven Kwan sunk the pit in Twins’ fans stomachs deeper; a blown lead felt inevitable. But Duran disagreed, and three unceasing outs capped by a strikeout of Josh Naylor ended the game in favor of the Twins.

Notes:

Bailey Ober's seven-inning start was the second-longest of his career.

Max Kepler has now hit 15 homers at Progressive Field—the most non-Target Field total of his career.

Jhoan Duran's seven saves ties him for sixth in MLB.

Post-Game Interview:

What’s Next?

Sonny Gray will face off against Logan Allen (the new one) in game two of the series; first pitch is at 5:10 PM.

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

 

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[Elite Benchwarmer]

Kepler loves Cleveland!

 

[ashbury]

Shutdown bullpen today!

[PDX Twin]

How bad is the AL Central? If you add up the four non-Twins teams, they have a .362 winning percentage, which is lower than EVERY OTHER TEAM in the AL except Oakland and EVERY TEAM in the NL except St Louis.

[Elite Benchwarmer]

I looked it up, and it looks like he's only been average in Cleveland.  He's had a few loud games, though.

 

[stringer bell]

JLopez and Duran have worked two days in a row. I suppose they'll be unavailable tomorrow night. Everybody else should be available. 

[ANDwon]

ESPN said Max Kepler broke up a perfect game with a 2 run homer. That's... not possible... 

[ANDwon]

2 minutes ago, ANDwon said:

ESPN said Max Kepler broke up a perfect game with a 2 run homer. That's... not possible... 

... Except in the 10th inning... Which it was not... 

[USAFChief]

14 minutes ago, ANDwon said:

ESPN said Max Kepler broke up a perfect game with a 2 run homer. That's... not possible... 

You know what they say...you might see something at a baseball game you've never seen before. 

[Dman]

Hell of a game by Ober.  If he and Varland are for real and the pen can stop giving up runs this team looks really tough to me.

[wabene]

Ober looks determined as hell. 

[GNess]

Nice win. The bullpen did its job, but the depth in the pen is suspect especially with Thielbar on the IL.

Are there arms in the minors that could be effective in the Twins BP? If not, then BP arms become the focus at the trade deadline. Looking ahead...

[VivaBomboRivera!]

4 hours ago, stringer bell said:

JLopez and Duran have worked two days in a row. I suppose they'll be unavailable tomorrow night. Everybody else should be available. 

'ceptin' Thielbar...  🤕

[Peter]

Excellent game last night and great win!!! With our aces pitching next 2 games love our chances for a sweep and blow open division!!!

[Dave The Dastardly]

How are they going to keep the kid down on the farm?

[jmlease1]

Ober was excellent. I really wondered whether how deep he could go into a game and he did a really nice job on a night with very little offense.

I was not terribly impressed with the Apple TV+ broadcast. The play-by-play guy was so unmemorable I can't even recall his name (Gary something?) and Dontrelle Willis was unimpressive. (He reminded me a little of Hawkins; pretty good when he talks about some of the specifics of pitching and terrible when he tries to go for laughs and go bigger than the game)

Needed the big bomb from Kepler, hope there's more offense to take the pressure off the pitching tonight (especially the bullpen) but it's pretty wonderful to have starting pitching like this. It's been a while since we've had anything close to this kind of quality and depth, and it feels like they can keep us in any game.

Up the Twins!

[Craig Arko]

I didn’t see the game as I was attending a drunken philosophers meetup. But by all accounts Ober impressed. That’s good, because he’s likely up for the duration. Now we need to see if Varland can do this, too.

[tony&rodney]

Max Kepler is still the one outfielder who you know will be in the lineup on most days. 

[joefish]

I miss Molitor. 

Where the hell are our bats?

[DJL44]

12 minutes ago, joefish said:

Where the hell are our bats?

The Twins are a below average 19th in OPS and lead the American League in strikeouts but they're 7th in HR. Cleveland is 30th in OPS and HR. That's the difference in offense between the teams - the Twins can hit one over the fence and Cleveland rarely homers.

[stringer bell]

Really, in the end, it's about scoring runs. The Twins stand at 12th in MLB in scoring runs, despite the numbers cited above. The team is dangerously close to becoming totally one-dimensional--they are scoring a high percentage of their runs on homers. They have homered in 17 straight games and their record in those games is................9-8. When they long balls don't come, I really don't like their chances. 

 

[jkcarew]

15 hours ago, ANDwon said:

ESPN said Max Kepler broke up a perfect game with a 2 run homer. That's... not possible... 

Ah…but it is possible!…

One team has a perfect game going into the 10th inning of a scoreless game. In the 10th inning, the team that hasn’t had a batter reach base, has their first batter hit a HR.

The perfect game is broken up by a 2-run homer.

 

(Edit: just saw where you had already acknowledged this. Sorry.)

 

[jkcarew]

15 hours ago, PDX Twin said:

How bad is the AL Central? If you add up the four non-Twins teams, they have a .362 winning percentage, which is lower than EVERY OTHER TEAM in the AL except Oakland and EVERY TEAM in the NL except St Louis.

Sneaky contributing factor…

New schedule has fewer games played within the divisions. For the ALC, that means the number of games for which they break even is smaller…and the number of games where teams outside the division demolish the ALC teams is greater.

[jkcarew]

Not allowing the opposition to score remains a foolproof plan for winning.

But, I’d like to see signs of a back-up plan.

[Guest]

9 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

Ober was excellent. I really wondered whether how deep he could go into a game and he did a really nice job on a night with very little offense.

I was not terribly impressed with the Apple TV+ broadcast. The play-by-play guy was so unmemorable I can't even recall his name (Gary something?) and Dontrelle Willis was unimpressive. (He reminded me a little of Hawkins; pretty good when he talks about some of the specifics of pitching and terrible when he tries to go for laughs and go bigger than the game)

Needed the big bomb from Kepler, hope there's more offense to take the pressure off the pitching tonight (especially the bullpen) but it's pretty wonderful to have starting pitching like this. It's been a while since we've had anything close to this kind of quality and depth, and it feels like they can keep us in any game.

Up the Twins!

I was just happy to see a game on the tv.