Twins 5, Pirates 1: Pablo López Extends Scoreless Streak; Matt Wallner Leaves Early in Win

[Matt Braun]

Well, not everything can be perfect. 

Image courtesy of Matt Blewett-USA TODAY Sports

Box Score
Pablo López: 6 IP, 6 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 7 K
Home Run: Michael A. Taylor (16)
Top 3 WPA: Pablo López (.331), Griffin Jax (.267), Michael A. Taylor (.251)
Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

It was a great day to kick off a glorious weekend. The bonus off-days allowed the Twins to re-shuffle their starting rotation, moving Dallas Keuchel to Sunday, as Friday’s start went to Pablo López. López had been excellent in his last two starts, holding both Detroit and Philadelphia scoreless over 13 innings of work. Friday was more of the same.

But it wasn’t easy. Pittsburgh was in no mood to go down easy. They jumped on López often, placing runners on base in every inning he pitched, but that One Big Hit never came; López slipped out of trouble every time. It was far from efficient, but the most important numbers—six innings; no earned runs—were all manager Rocco Baldelli was looking for. 

The start extended López’s scoreless innings streak to 19. Orel Hershiser will remain at peace, but the streak has been impressive, and for a starter who may have gotten unlucky earlier in the year, a new ERA of 3.51 is closer to his true talent. 

The Twins had trouble with Pittsburgh starter Andre Jackson. He wasn’t fully stretched out, but that didn’t appear to matter much to him. The Twins could gain baserunners, but they evidently suffered under a similar hex as their black and gold opponents, as they failed to knock in their brethren, forcing them to trudge through much of the game unable to support their starter. 

“Much of the game,” isn’t all of the game, however, as Minnesota did strike against Jackson eventually. Christian Vázquez softly served a changeup into center field. Perhaps believing in his cambio’s ability to earn weak contact, Jackson threw it again to Michael A. Taylor. He was wrong. Taylor took a mighty hack at a changeup low, but not low enough, and the ball finally landed 410 feet later as Taylor slowed down his effort to a celebratory jog.

The Twins scored again in the 6th, when—following a Matt Wallner double—Donovan Solano cracked a single into center. 

Baseball has a sense of humor, though. López’s ability to escape danger did not translate to Caleb Thielbar. The lefty was shocked to learn that these Pittsburgh batters meant business, and they quickly plated their first run of the ballgame.

Griffin Jax entered. Despite him imploding in catastrophic fashion on Wednesday, turning a potential win into a close loss against a team they really should have beat, Baldelli believed Jax to be the best bet to get out of the jam. It made sense, really. 

And he was perfect. Ke’Bryan Hayes popped out, Jack Suwinski struck out staring at a sweeper, and Henry Davis at least made it look pretty by swinging for his strikeout. Somehow, no runners scored. Such is the life of a reliever. 

The Twins scored a critical insurance run when Jorge Polanco tricked the Pirates into staring at his pop fly, bringing home the fourth run of the game. Kyle Farmer did basically the same thing the following at-bat, but he one-upped his teammate by taking second. The trade-off for such fortune was cruel: Wallner took a fastball off his hands and couldn’t even attempt to talk his way into staying into the game. The team later announced he suffered a right hand contusion. 

Not much happened after that. Well, Pirates pitcher Yohan Ramirez plunked a few batters, causing Baldelli to consternate and scour, but nothing came of it. Jhoan Duran entered to get back on the horse, and he struck out the side. That's quite the horse to get back on. 

Notes:

Carlos Correa's hitting streak ended at nine. He walked twice and struck out twice.

Michael A. Taylor's 16 homers on the year are three off his career-high of 19 set in 2017.

Pablo López's seven strikeouts pushed his season total to 187, tying him with Toronto's Kevin Gausman for the second-highest total in MLB. Spencer Strider leads everyone with 227 strikeouts. 

Post-Game Interview:

 

 

 

What’s Next?
The Twins and Pirates will play the second game of their series on Saturday. Sonny Gray will start for Minnesota. First pitch is at 6:10 PM. 

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

 

View full article

[BH67]

Guardians salvage a split vs. the Tigers.  5 up with 39 to play,  I suppose I should panic.

[Matt Braun]

Jax escaping that inning without any extra earned runs was some of the finest relief pitching I've ever seen. 

[DocBauer]

Lopez...great.

Thielbar...eeks. But I still trust him.

Jax...great. How can you be great 90% of the time and all anybody remembers is the bad 10%?

Pagan..............how long do I have to admit he's been pretty good all year and great the past few months? It leaves a weird taste in my mouth and my nerves still tingle when he pitches, but the guy actually has been very good.

Duran...so he's human. Once in a while he'll have a bad day. Maybe his control or sequencing hasn't been on target lately. He's still mostly gotten the job done. His stuff tonight made me knees weak, and I was sitting down!

Boy oh boy do I hope Wallner is OK. Painful as hell, but if it hit the "meaty" side of his hand, he should hopefully be OK. We can't afford to lose him.

I KNOW the Pirates pitcher...Ramirez??...surely didn't mean to hit 2 batters. But I wouldn't have blamed Rocco for jumping out of the dugout, make a scene, demand the pitcher be removed, etc, etc. Nothing would have happened other than a possible 1 game discipline for Rocco. Still...I wouldn't have blamed him for going on a small tirade.

[stringer bell]

It’s his buddy Shelton in the other dugout. I think that mattered in this case. 

[stringer bell]

To echo a thought from the game thread, much less complaining about Arraez when López has another scoreless outing and Arraez’ OPS is about the same as Julien’s. 
 

Rocco seemed to think Wallner was okay, maybe out for a day or two. Lots of times, small fractures aren’t found on that first x-ray. 
 

Joe Ryan allowed one hit (homer) in four innings. Two walks and seven strikeouts. 

[Richard Swerdlick]

I look at Detroit and feel a bit stressed. I believe that they will pass Cleveland. I think of the 51 Giants or the 78 Yankees who were further behind than this in mid August and came back. I hope my fears are misplaced.

[DJL44]

Correa has been very good in August -.830 OPS

[jmlease1]

Good job by Lopez is working around trouble last night. Sometimes you can see giving up those hits and putting the leadoff guy on getting in a pitcher's head, but Lopez seemed unfazed. He's a really good pitcher and he's having an excellent season. Thrilled to have him locked down in the rotation long term.

Jax has had his troubles recently, but did a great job cleaning up for Thielbar. Would have been nice to only use 3 relievers last night, but sometimes a guy gets beat and that's what happened to Thielbar. Pagan has been good this season; the WHIP is impressive and he seems much less prone to lobbing in a "get over" pitch that gets smoked this season.

Hope all the guys who got plunked are ok, especially Wallner who had the added indignity of getting plunked and having it be a strike. Wallner has been really doing well and I'd hate to see his season get disrupted.

Props to Royce Lewis for making a tremendous play at 3B. Turned a double into an out and saved a run. Just stay healthy!

 

[Linus]

Royce is really a good athlete. Just the way he moves to the ball is noticeably quicker and smoother than most 3 rd baseman. 

[mikelink45]

Good game and good comments.  The only other takeaway for me is continually seeing Sands at the bottom of the BP list with no appearances.  Surely there must be someone we would actually see enter a game. 

[Peter]

Kinda a nervous win as Pablo was shaky but got out of jams. Especially Jax in 7th inning. Lewis with web gem as well. Workmen like win. Up lead to 5 games. Go twins!!!

[Whitey333]

Having sands wasting away a spot in the bullpen is terrible.  If we don't have anyone in the minors any better then we are hurting.  Great game.  Everything looks good until the next losing streak comes along.  Go Twins

[stringer bell]

34 minutes ago, Whitey333 said:

Having sands wasting away a spot in the bullpen is terrible.  If we don't have anyone in the minors any better then we are hurting.  Great game.  Everything looks good until the next losing streak comes along.  Go Twins

Per BBRef: Sands has faced zero batters in medium or high leverage. Headrick has faced 10 batters in medium and high leverage (2 high leverage and 8 medium leverage). Winder has faced 5 batters in medium leverage, none in high leverage. The Twins have carried at least one of these guys all season and often more than one and they all reasonably could have been replaced by Andrew Bechtold, who could fill in at the infield positions.

[GNess]

Lopez is proving to be a good addition now and likely for a number of seasons. He is solid.

[insagt1]

I know back a few months ago there was a lot of passioned talk about the Arraez-Lopez trade. And I admit freely I was a critic--with reservations given its a long season.

No one expected Arraez to hit ,400, honestly. And we ALL hoped Lopez would eventually turn into the 'ace' we hoped we obtained.

So now as August draws to a close, Arraeiz is at .361 and is only .230 over the past 15 games. He has predictably cooled off and is seeking his 'level''...which is still pretty good. He would have to disappear to not win the NL batting title. But more importantly Lopez has constantly gotten better. He is really now our 'ace' in the rotation and he will be a force should Twins hang on to 1st place.

This becomes a cautionary tale for us all not to jump to early conclusions when a baseball season is 162 games long.  I am very happy that Lopez is excelling because that means good things for the Twins. Still a ways to go but the outlook sure seems positive. We know its wrong to judge a trade too quickly...but as fans, sometimes we can't help ourselves. I will continue to learn from this!

I certainly wish Arraez well, but its more important that Lopez is 'our guy'!

[joefish]

How do I find/ access the posting thread during the game? 

[CRF]

Nice win. Lopez was in trouble just about every inning, but came out of it ok. It sure would SUCK if Wallner goes down. Hopefully, it's just a bruise and he only misses a game or two. I'm not too worried about Gray tonight, but Keuchel tomorrow could be a problem. If he gets shelled again, I wouldn't give him another start. 

[wabene]

23 minutes ago, joefish said:

How do I find/ access the posting thread during the game? 

The forums tab at the top of the page, then click on Minnesota Twins talk. The game thread will be there if it has been created. Sometimes there is a banner, usually green, at the top of any page.

Another great tool on this site is this button that looks like a page icon in between the circle with the half moon and the plus. It shows content being discussed currently that you have not read yet

 

[roger]

Interesting there was no mention of Royce Lewis at all.

His double and the run he scored was a big run.  But, his play at third was amazing.  Had he not gotten it that runner would have scored as the next hitter also had a double.  A run there would have given the Pirates some MO and who knows.

[Jeff K]

3 hours ago, jmlease1 said:

Good job by Lopez is working around trouble last night. Sometimes you can see giving up those hits and putting the leadoff guy on getting in a pitcher's head, but Lopez seemed unfazed. He's a really good pitcher and he's having an excellent season. Thrilled to have him locked down in the rotation long term.

Jax has had his troubles recently, but did a great job cleaning up for Thielbar. Would have been nice to only use 3 relievers last night, but sometimes a guy gets beat and that's what happened to Thielbar. Pagan has been good this season; the WHIP is impressive and he seems much less prone to lobbing in a "get over" pitch that gets smoked this season.

Hope all the guys who got plunked are ok, especially Wallner who had the added indignity of getting plunked and having it be a strike. Wallner has been really doing well and I'd hate to see his season get disrupted.

Props to Royce Lewis for making a tremendous play at 3B. Turned a double into an out and saved a run. Just stay healthy!

 

I agree, that was a very nice play by Royce at 3rd base.  I think Solano did a fine job making the catch and keeping his foot on the bag at 1st.  Solano was a really smart pick up this spring training.  Who knew?  The guy can flat out hit.

[Jocko87]

1 hour ago, joefish said:

How do I find/ access the posting thread during the game? 

It's a pretty private club. You'll need the secret code word and knock.

[Squirrel]

1 hour ago, joefish said:

How do I find/ access the posting thread during the game? 

The game threads are always posted in the Twins Talk forum here:
https://twinsdaily.com/forums/forum/6-minnesota-twins-talk/

More often than not they are posted well before game time so you can get your banter practice in. If you have any issues finding them, send me a PM.

Also, game threads are archived early the following day and can be found in the archived game thread forum, if you want to read through any of them

[Matt Braun]

5 hours ago, Richard Swerdlick said:

I look at Detroit and feel a bit stressed. I believe that they will pass Cleveland. I think of the 51 Giants or the 78 Yankees who were further behind than this in mid August and came back. I hope my fears are misplaced.

The 78 Yankees had Munson, Chambliss, Reggie, Guidry, Catfish, and Gossage. 

The 23 Tigers… do not have that. 

[stringer bell]

23 minutes ago, Matt Braun said:

The 78 Yankees had Munson, Chambliss, Reggie, Guidry, Catfish, and Gossage. 

The 23 Tigers… do not have that. 

Torkleson and Greene look like keepers, but they don’t have a bunch of next-level guys to step up. They have some pitching talent (notably Skubel and Rodriguez). 
 

It appears to me that the vets they brought in (Grossman, Baéz, Schoop) really didn’t work out in the long run. Too many holes to catch the Twins this year, but they could be a lot better next year. 

[joefish]

49 minutes ago, Jocko87 said:

It's a pretty private club. You'll need the secret code word and knock.

Will cold pizza and warm Hamms get me in?

[Patzky]

1 hour ago, Jocko87 said:

It's a pretty private club. You'll need the secret code word and knock.

The password is 'Gaetti'.

[Doctor Gast]

I was excited to see Lopez, Lewis & Endy Rodriguez play in this game. None of them disappointed me. MAT came through again to get that crucial hit.

I was impressed how Rodriguez caught with such flair as a new rookie.

[USAFChief]

4 hours ago, joefish said:

Will cold pizza and warm Hamms get me in?

What kinna pizza? 

[Jocko87]

6 hours ago, joefish said:

Will cold pizza and warm Hamms get me in?

Prolly, it doesn't matter how good the pizza is I'll eat it.