Jose Berrios continued his dominance and struck out 11 Marlin batters as he threw seven scoreless innings. The Twins’ offense rebounded from their slow night last night and jumped on Sandy Alcantara for seven runs and ran him out of the game before he finished the fifth inning. Sean Poppen blew the shutout with a grand slam, but Rogers shut down their rally.
Image courtesy of FanGraphs
Berrios: 7 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 11 K, 69.1% strikes (56 of 81 pitches)
Bullpen: 2 IP, 4 H, 4 ER, 0 BB, 5 K
Home Runs: Garver (20), Rosario (23), Kepler (29)
Multi-Hit Games: Garver (2-for-4, HR), Rosario (2-for-4, HR, 2B)
Top 3 WPA: Garver .241, Berrios .200, Kepler .158
Berrios Lights Out
Bert Blyleven said before Berrios’ start that he would give him a high-five and a pat on the back if he threw a complete game shutout. He struck out a season-high 11 batters, had a 1-2-3 inning in six out of seven innings he pitched. Unfortunately, he was pulled after just seven innings throwing only 81 pitches.
Berrios was perfect through four innings while striking out six of the nine batters he faced. In the fifth, he surrendered two weak-hit balls for singles, but followed it up by getting the next three batters out, one via a strikeout. In the sixth inning, he struck out the side to bring his total up to ten on the night.
In his last inning, he picked up his season-high 11th strikeout of the night, but fell short of his career high of 12 after being pulled after just 81 pitches. Berrios was unstoppable on the mound tonight but was pulled before he was able to go for a complete game. Berrios is still deserving of a high-five and a pat on the back after he silenced this Marlins’ team.
Bomba Squad
After an unorthodox night from the Twins’ offense, they pounced on Sandy Alcantara for three home runs and forced him out of the game before he could even finish the fifth inning.
Mitch Garver got things going after Jose Berrios battled a leadoff walk which was followed by Max Kepler’s second walk of the day. Garver ended an 0-for-17 streak with a 3-run bomba to capitalize on the leadoff walks. This was just the start of the hitting fun for the Twins tonight.
Kepler led off the fifth inning with a solo shot for his 29th home run of the year to put him in third in the A.L. lead in home runs.
The fifth inning wasn’t done for Alcantara, after Garver hit a swinging bunt down the third base line, Eddie Rosario hit the team’s third home run of the game. This was only Eddie’s hit fourth home run since June 5th in 31 games. After a walk and double, Alcantara’s night was done, but another run was surrendered on a Schoop single to add on to his rough night.
Poppen Blows Shutout
Sean Poppen came in after a stellar performance by Berrios and worked through the eighth inning with ease. The ninth was completely different as he gave up three straight singles to start the inning followed by a grand slam by Brian Anderson to cut the deficit to only three runs. Poppen picked up a strikeout on the following batter before Taylor Rogers came in to close out the game striking out the two batters he faced.
Postgame With Baldelli
Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet
Click herefor a review of the number of pitches thrown by each member of the bullpen over the past five days.