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Twins 8, Royals 4: East Bound & Up

Sound the horn—the Buck Truck strikes again!

Kansas City Royals v Minnesota Twins Photo by David Berding/Getty Images

“So you got to dodge ‘em and you got to duck ‘em, you got to keep that diesel truckin’—just put that hammer down and give it hell!”

Today’s Twins/Royals contest represented the end of a long homestand for the Minnesota Twins. Though performance-wise it was fine (6-4), the weather frustratingly kept attendance sparse. With temps hovering in the mid-40s and biting 20-30 mph winds under a sunless sky, this game may have been the ultimate fan challenge. Fortunately, the Twins gave the die-hard faithful a lot to cheer about!

For a little while this looked to be a small-ball sort of affair, what with the first run coming off a Nick Gordon squeeze bunt scoring Byron Buxton.

But in the 3rd inning, with Max Kepler & Carlos Correa on base in front of him, Buxton deposited a no-doubter—none of that wall-scraping nonsense from yesterday—into the third deck to give the Twin Cities squad a 4-0 advantage.

Kansas City Royals v Minnesota Twins
Cue the air horn...
Photo by David Berding/Getty Images

Not content with the 4-spot, the Twins kept knocking safeties—Gordon, Willi Castro, & Christian Vazquez—and when the dust had settled (probably literally in all that wind) it was 8-0 Twins!

Meanwhile, Sonny Gray was up to his usual routine: 6 IP, 7 K, 1 BB, 1 ER. Remarkably, such an outing will increase Gray’s microscopic ERA. It did, however, largely (see: Duds) allow Rocco Baldelli to rest the high-leverage bullpen arms that had become a bit over-exposed of late.

All in all, though, a nice series-clinching victory over the Royals for those who stuck it out. Hopefully by the time the team returns from the Windy City & Believeland, t-shirts and shorts will have replaced parkas and long-johns.

Your final: Twins 8, Royals 4.

Studs:

  • Byron Buxton for Byron Buxton reasons.
  • All the fans—not just today but this past week—who braved the conditions to root, root, root for the home team through facemarks and glove-thumping instead of traditional applause.
  • Sonny Gray for continuing to be stingy in any climate.
Kansas City Royals v Minnesota Twins
Truly the only thing “Sonny” about 4/30/23
Photo by David Berding/Getty Images

Duds:

  • Home plate umpire Vic Carapazza, who had a curious strike zone and was calling questionable pitch clock violations all over the place. A dictator behind the plate—the worst kind of umpiring IMO.
  • Josh Winder, whose terrible 9th inning once again (I believe this has happened 2-3 times now to different mop-up guys) required Jhoan Duran to be brought in for the final out.

Comment of the Game:

norff, for presumably having peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on the brain when Gray was escaping a jam (heh heh).