Orioles 2, Twins 1: Liriano's Quality Start Just Not Enough

After his second solid start in a row, Francisco Liriano still wasn't able to get a win, as the offense couldn't manage to plate more than one run tonight at Target Field against the Orioles. Liriano was sharp tonight, going just six innings, but only allowing four hits and striking out ten batters. One of the four hits Liriano allowed was a 2-run bomb to Baltimore outfielder Adam Jones, which would unfortunately determine the outcome of the game. Josh Willingham hit his 23rd homer of the year, but it wouldn't be enough for the Twins to win their third in a row.

The bullpen did return to its previous, talented form tonight, as Casey Fien and Glen Perkins combined for a scoreless 3 innings, with Fien only giving up one hit to the Orioles lineup. With Frankie's good start, and the bullpen's quality pitching, the Twins should have been able to pull out a win against Tommy Hunter and the O's bullpen (aside, maybe, from Johnson, the closer with 27 saves already). The offense, after two nights of excellent hitting and run-scoring, couldn't quite pull anything together and only managed 8 hits off the Orioles pitchers.

Full recap, notes, and studs & duds after the jump...

The only Twins with more than one hit tonight were Josh Willingham and Trevor Plouffe, who both had two each. Four of the batters had no hits, including DH Joe Mauer (worthless!1!!). The bright side of the offense? Jamey Carroll was the only Twins player to actually strike out tonight. Sad, or impressive? You be the judge!

Notes
-In his last 10 starts, Liriano has given up 28 walks and struck out 77 batters in 66 1/3 innings.
-The Twins were 0-for-6 with RISP tonight. Not going to win games with numbers like that.
-Matt Capps is out indefinitely. Should be interesting to see what's done with the bullpen at this point.

Studs
Liriano, Fien/Perkins, Willinghammer

Duds
The rest of the offense