Twins 6, Athletics 3: Garcia solid in Minnesota debut

There were rumors that Jaime Garcia, acquired from Atlanta on Monday, wouldn’t make it to his slated debut for Minnesota on Friday, a victim of a 4-game losing streak and sizzling runs from Cleveland and Kansas City. That highly comical scenario did not come to pass, and Garcia was rock solid as the mid-rotation guy Minnesota needs, pitching 6 and ²⁄₃ non-awful innings in a 6-3 Twins win.

Minnesota’s offense gave Garcia plenty of cushion to work with, attacking A’s starter Daniel Gossett early and often. Terrible base-running by Eddie Rosario (I hope you were sitting down when you read that) kept the Twins to just one run in the second, but they broke through in the fourth, posting four runs on a mix of singles, doubles, and wild pitches.

Garcia wasn’t shutting Oakland down completely, allowing a few too many leadoff hitters on, but managed to weave his way out of trouble with a couple exceptions. A Ryan Lavarnway double in the bottom of the fourth plated the first two Oakland runs, then the teams traded runs in the fifth on Jason Castro’s second run-scoring double and a Khris Davis RBI single.

The bullpens were equally adequate, with Matt Belisle being unexpectedly great, getting four key outs with zero drama. Brandon Kintzler got yet another save.

Unfortunately, Cleveland and Kansas City extended their winning streaks to eight and nine games, respectively, so Minnesota still has a hill to climb if they want to get back into contention.

STUDS: Belisle, Castro, and Garcia. If this was the latter’s only start as a Twin, three earned runs and seven Ks while pitching into the seventh was a fine effort.

DUDS: Gossett. Honestly, the Twins should’ve gotten to double digits in this game.

ROBOT ROLL CALL:

Enjoy your weekend, everybody.