FAST REACTION: Twins 7, White Sox 5

The Twins, outside of a stray Chris Colabello dinger, had no answers for John Danks most of the day.  And after Kyle Gibson gave up his second home run of the day in the bottom of the 5th, giving the White Sox a 3-1 lead, it looked like Minnesota was on its way to dropping the first half of Friday's twin bill.

BUT THAT'S WHY YOU PLAY ALL NINE INNINGS, TURKEYS!

Danks ran into control issues in the top of the 7th, walking the first two batters and being pulled from the game.  After a Brian Dozier strikeout, Joe Mauer walked to load the bases for fresh-off-the-DL Josh Willingham, who also struck out.  Into the box stepped Canadian veteran Justin Morneau, who fouled off three 2-strike pitches before WHACKING a fourth, scoring all three runners in front of him as well as himself, which is known as a "grand slam" in certain circles.  Morneau would add another jack job in the top of the 9th as the Twins went on to a 7-5 win.

Highlights:

• I mentioned the grand slam, right?
• The lead held up thanks to another solid effort from the bullpen in the persons of Brian Deunsing (who got the victory by striking out the only batter he faced), Jared Burton and Casey Fien.  Glen Perkins, in a NON-SAVE SITUATION, ran into some trouble in the 9th, giving up 2 runs on 3 hits before striking out Adam Dunn to end it.
• Colabello's dinger (another oppo jack job) provided us with this delightful GIF of Burton stage-punching Deunsing.  (Thanks, Bryz!) Relievers are a different breed.
• Oswaldo Arcia added an insurance dong in the 8th.
• Gibson: 5.2 IP, 3 ER (on two home runs), 4 K, 4 BB.  Not great.

Robot Rollcall

1. WestRiverTwinsFan
2. jere.johnson.37
3. DavidRF
4. gunnathor
5. Myjah Weird Twitter
6. MNWildcat
7. blakem95
8. Collin Kottke from Buffalo Lake, Minnesota
9. SooFoo Fan
10. twinsbrewer

Charts & Graphs

Source: FanGraphs

See you for Game 2, baseball pals.  Will put up the game thread as soon as I see the starting lineups.