Twins Surmount Kluber, Edge Cleveland in Extras

Corey Kluber was unhittable for five innings. The defending Cy Young winner allowed NOTHING, striking out seven and not breaking a sweat.  Meanwhile, Mike Pelfrey labored through five innings, giving up one run and throwing about 230 pitches.  A Brandon Moss solo dong off Tim Stauffer in the sixth gave Kluber what looked like an insurmountable lead.

BUT.

Oswaldo Arcia singled.  Chris Herrmann knocked him in.  Then Herrmann took an extremely circuitous route around the bases (throwing error, wild pitch on a strikeout) to score the second run. Brian Dozier grounded into a double play to end the threat, but the important thing was that the Twins had somehow tied Kluber up.

The bullpen was fantastic, as Aaron Thompson threw two scoreless innings of relief, and Glen Perkins, pitching in a non-save situation, was equally effective.  Meat Raffle got two outs, the previously dreadful Blaine Boyer got the final four and the win.

How'd they get the win?  Well, after stranding all of the runners on base in the 9th and 10th, Trevor Plouffe stroked a majestic dong in the bottom of the 11th to end the game.  Like so:

(vine courtesy @willsworldmn)

Robot Roll Call

Charts & Graphs

Source: FanGraphs

Enjoy your weekend, everybody.