Twins Game Recap (7/18): Rosario Ignites Late-Inning Comeback

Box Score

Gibson: 7 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 0 BB, 7 K, 68.9% strikes (73 of 106 pitches)

Bullpen: 2 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K

Home Runs: Rosario (21), Garver (16), Cron (18)

Multi-Hit Games: None

WPA of +0.1: Rogers .160, Sano .210, Rosario .465

WPA of -0.1: Garver -.108

Rosario Redeems and Garver, Cron Solidify

A night after Eddie Rosario dropped what would have been an inning-ending fly ball to keep the game within reach, he blasts the first pitch he sees tonight to give the Twins a 4-3 lead. Rosario was most likely not in the lineup tonight as punishment for yesterday’s mishap, but made his presence felt tonight.

https://twitter.com/cjzer0/status/1152049149182926853

That was just the second pinch-hit home run for the Twins this season, and of course Rosario was the culprit of the first one as well. In 12 at-bats as a pinch-hitter, Rosario has three hits for three home runs.

Mitch Garver and C.J. gave the final punches in tonight’s game by each hitting a solo shot in the eighth for huge insurance runs to give them a three-run lead going into the ninth. The Athletic’s bullpen gave up three hits in tonight’s game, but they were the three biggest hits for the Twins.

Pitcher’s Rematch

Just over two weeks ago, Kyle Gibson and Mike Fiers faced up against each other, but unlike tonight, neither pitcher picked up a decision in that 12-inning contest. Tonight Gibson got rewarded for his solid outing, and the Twins picked up just their second win against Fiers in 13 games against him.

Gibson had another great outing against the Athletics, but this time was actually able to pick up the win. He pitched his deepest into a game and picked up his most strikeouts since June 25th. It was very impressive to see Gibson work around a few errors, not give up any walks, and pick up the win. He struck out three batters with his two-seam, and two batters with each of his changeup and slider.

Rogers' Save

Taylor Rogers started warming up immediately following Rosario’s go-ahead home run for a six-out save. Rogers has been the Twins’ best reliever, and continued his great season tonight. He gave up two singles in the eighth, but that was nothing to worry about as he retired the next five batters to complete the save and end the Twins’ longest losing streak of the season.

Sloppy Play

The Twins sloppy play has been pretty apparent since the All-Star break, and it continued tonight. Coming into tonight’s game they had six errors in five games and added two more in the first two innings. A couple of base-running errors also ended Twins’ threat in two different innings.

The base-running errors were the ones that hurt the most tonight. The first one came with a man on third base and one out. Max Kepler ripped a line drive to first base, which Olson made a nice grab on, and doubled up Cave who was halfway to home plate.

The next one came after a leadoff walk and single, when Arraez thought Cave had been hit by a pitch and was making his way to third only to realize the ball was still in play and proceeded to get thrown out on his way back to second.

Though the errors didn’t lead to anything tonight, it still is something that you want to clean up because they usually come back to hurt. Arraez and Sano were responsible for the fielding errors tonight with Arraez picking up a two-base error in the first after misfiring a throw to first, and Sano misfielding a hard hit ball that landed 10 feet in front of him.

Postgame With Baldelli

https://twitter.com/fsnorth/status/1152071444949397505

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

Click here for a review of the number of pitches thrown by each member of the bullpen over the past five days.