Sox Edge Twins, 3-2

The Twins jumped on Jeff Samardzija early and got a nice start from Phil Hughes, but were unable to capitalize on both efforts in a 3-2 loss to the Chicago White Sox in the City of Big Elbows, the Windy Place Itself, Chi-towne.

It certainly looked like Minnesota was picking up right where they left off with the South Area-ers, a 4-game sweep at Target Field.  Joe Mauer drilled a double to plate Torii Hunter to open the scoring, then stole third and scored on a Trevor Plouffe sac fly to make the score 2-0 in the first inning.  Then the offense went home for the day. (This is an exaggeration, but barely; Samardzija retired 17 straight at one point.)

Meanwhile, Hughes was very much good and pitched well enough to grab his fourth straight win, the only blemish on his night being a two-run double from Geovany Soto.  He was aided by a fantastic diving catch from Aaron Hicks in the second inning that I can't find a Vine or MLB video of, but it was really nice.

Aaron Thompson took over for Hughes in the eighth, and promptly walked the leadoff hitter.  This was bad, because the Twins, as mentioned, had no intent on doing anything offensively the rest of the night, and the White Sox were able to put a single and medium deep pop fly together to make that walk the difference in the game.  David Robertson pitched a 1-2-3 ninth to end it.  Pickles.

Robot Roll Call

Charts & Graphs

Source: FanGraphs

Have a great weekend everybody drive safe and drive friendly.