stringer bell

The Twins had a good chance tonight against Bieber. It would have been nice to go up 2-0 against their closest pursuer, but the baseball gods usually even things out. They were quite fortunate to hold on the night before, so going 1-1 with Berríos on the hill for the rubber match seems about right.

For tonight, Romo, Clippard, Rogers and May are out, Thielbar, Wisler and Poppen, along with Alcala should be good to go. Duffey hasn't pitched in two days either. If Dick Mountain gives the Twins five innings, they should be good to get through the game. Columbe and Smeltzer also should be available, so having all of the pitchers seems to be the right thing to do.

They'l leave Cleveland in first place, or at least tied. Two games to play to win a game and win their fourth consecutive series. It hasn't always been pretty (tonight wasn't) but they are doing enough to win.

13 hits in Rogers' last 6.1 innings. I don't think that can be explained away on bad luck.

Strike 2 and 3 to Allen were nice pitches. I didn't think Romo threw many other tough pitches.

Too bad on the Santana at-bat, but May has gotten away with some bad pitches.

They should have a lot of guys ready to pitch tomorrow (Alcala, Smeltzer, Poppen,Wisler, Duffey), but they're short today. May is in now, Romo and Rogers will probably pitch today if the Twins have the lead, but then they probably couldn't pitch tomorrow.

Anxiety filled bottom of the sixth. Thielbar gets the job done. Yes, with all the pitchers used yesterday and Maeda only going 5, the Twins are a bit hemmed in.

Opposite field hits continue.

Except for the Santana plate appearance, I think Kulpa has been better than most calling balls and strikes.

Both Twins hits have gone the opposite way. I know this goes against the current philosophy of hitting, but sometimes going with the pitch is a good strategy.

Hey everyone, there’s a game on!

Eddie not running hard on a pop up.

What I’ve seen is real inconsistency by the live umps and makes the players have no idea whether the borderline low/high/inside/outside pitch will be called a strike. If an ump is consistent giving or taking a couple inches, the players can adjust, if he’s not, it’s a crapshoot.

Ian Miller recalled by the Cubs.

Brian Navarreto, who was in the Twins' organization for six years is being promoted to the majors by Miami. Also Sean Gilmartin was DFAed by the Rays, while they placed Nick Anderson in the IL. None of these three every played a major league game for the Twins, but were in their organization.

I don't know if it is the weird season or something else, but the ball and strike calls seem to have been dreadful this year. The Twins have had the Jerry Meals crew for seemingly half of their games (or more) and maybe they are substandard. Meals himself had one of the worst games this year, perhaps ever IMHO. Hickox (sp) last night was really bad too. ONTH I recall two games that were excellent. One was by the tall rookie ump in the Meals crew and the other was a young ump, perhaps Hispanic, I can't remember his name.

Still need nine outs. Let's go!

I was about to criticize all the moves so early in the game, but it looks like this was the key inning. I tend to worry about going to the second of two catchers, I guess that's the Gardy in me.

Miguel Sanó earning his paycheck!

They could move Marwin to left and keep Adrianza in the game at third base.

C'mon Marwin!

Adrianza pinch-running, but who is going to pitch the ninth?

I didn't think he swung.

Didn’t Dobnak catch another line drive like that earlier this year?