Notebook: Saucy Offense, Berrios Rolls

Red Sox 14, Twins 6 (7 innings)

Box Score | Baseball Savant

Twins Takeaways

Standout pitcher: José Berríos (2 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 3 K).

Standout hitter: Nelson Cruz (1-3, 3 R HR in first spring game)

Fastest pitch: Ian Hamilton 95.5 mph

Max exit velo: Nelson Cruz 108.6 mph

After some early FSN mishaps, the Twins finally had their first televised Spring Training game of 2021.

https://twitter.com/J_D_Cameron/status/1367175997611782149

Matthew Trueblood wrote up some of what to watch for in Bérríos’ first spring start, and indeed, his season for the Twins. Bérríos was effective and efficient, striking out 3 over 2 innings of work, which included using his changeup 20% of the time. Bérríos hit 95.1 mph on the gun.

https://twitter.com/AlexFast8/status/1367176749562421252

Other Twins pitching performances were less impressive. Alex Colomé served up a succession of meatballs over the heart of the plate. Colomé gave up six hard hit balls and four earned runs on five hits.

Glenn Sparkman, Chandler Shepard, and Andrew Albers all gave up multiple runs. Early Sire of Fort Myers frontrunner Ian Hamilton pitched his second scoreless inning of spring, striking out two to continue his impressive start to Spring Training.

The offense was a saucy affair, with Mitch Garver hitting an opposite field home run which Statcast missed, while Kyle Garlick hit his second home run of Spring.

https://twitter.com/andluedtke/status/1367179392116535296

Then Nelson Cruz came to the plate in the bottom of the fifth, and did this.

https://twitter.com/SlangsOnSports/status/1367207298783969281

Cruz launched a 390 foot rocket to left center in his first game of the pre-season. In a world full of change, Cruz remains the source of constancy Twins fans need.

Tomorrow: Rays at Twins, 12:05 CST, Yarbrough VS Maeda.

Other News

Dan Hayes of the Athletic mentioned Tuesday that the Twins had checked in on Danny Santana and Eric Sogard as additional infield depth. On Wednesday morning, Sogard signed a MiLB deal with the Cubs

https://twitter.com/mlbtraderumors/status/1367130927567155203

Hayes also noted the primary challenge of reconnecting with Santana would be not wanting to guarantee a MLB contract.

https://twitter.com/DanHayesMLB/status/1367136659536547847

Elsewhere 2021 fantasy baseball darling Framber Valdez was diagnosed with a fractured finger, Jon Lester will undergo surgery to remove his thyroid gland, and Aaron Boone will take a medical leave of absence from the Yankees in order to have a pacemaker implanted.

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