The most perfect strike thrown by a Twins player on Saturday — and there were a lot of good ones — was unleashed by shortstop Carlos Correa, a spin-and-fire, one-hop relay from short left field that turned the Tigers' lone scoring chance into an inning-ending out.
Twins squeak past Tigers 2-0 with six pitchers, just enough offense and big play on defense
The Twins snuffed out a potential Detroit run to end the top of the fifth inning, then pushed across two runs on a walk and two singles in the bottom half.
June 18, 2023 at 12:10AM
That, and a couple of well-placed, well-timed singles were all the Twins needed — fortunately, since it's about all they got — to hand the Tigers a lightning-quick 2-0 loss at Target Field.
"Just a great throw. If we get it to him in time, [Correa] has the strongest arm in the league and they're going to be out," said Royce Lewis, who watched from a few feet away as his fellow infielder caught a throw from Willi Castro in the left field corner and redirected it to the plate with Tigers runner Zack Short already halfway home. "Willi gave it to him accurately and quickly. That's all you've got to do, get it in and let Carlos do the rest."
Moments later, Castro had a big moment at the plate, too, breaking up former teammate Joey Wentz's no-hit bid in the fifth inning by following Lewis' walk with a line drive into left field. Alex Kirilloff then pulled a ground ball into right field to score Lewis and move Castro to third. When Kirilloff broke up a possible double play with a hard slide into second base, Castro scored the game's final run.
One underrated factor in that brief-but-effective Twins rally? Rocco Baldelli relocating himself from his usual seat near home plate to the opposite end of the dugout. Not that he's superstitious or anything.
"We were getting something going!" Baldelli said. "It wasn't me, of course. But I liked where I was standing today when we were scoring runs."
Maybe he should have stayed there. In a development that's either extremely encouraging or regrettably recurrent, the Twins added only one other hit all day, an eighth-inning pop-fly double to short right field by Michael A. Taylor. Yet for the second time this season — the other at Cleveland on May 5 — they turned their three hits into a 2-0 victory.
Focus on the result, not the route to get there, Baldelli insisted.
"Dwelling on the things you're not doing is not productive. There's nothing positive coming out of that," he said. "Our guys did a great job today. Our dugout was loud. The guys were pulling for their teammates. The guys were locked in on what was going on in the game when it was still 0-0 and we were just trying to get something going. I'm looking up and going, 'that's the way it's supposed to be' and I thought it was beautiful.
"And we ended up getting the job done."
That's because a half-dozen Twins relievers combined to not only give the starting rotation a day off, but to out-pitch them as well.
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José De León made his first start since April 11, 2021, and retired all six Tigers he faced. Emilio Pagán recorded easy outs against the next five hitters, and Brent Headrick, recalled before the game, earned his first career victory by contributing 2⅓ shutout innings. Brock Stewart needed only five pitches to retire three Tigers, and though Griffin Jax and Jhoan Duran each surrendered leadoff singles, both were erased by double plays.
Aside from the spectacle of the game's first 26 hitters going out in order (and in under an hour), the day's lone thrilling moment came in the top of the fifth, against Headrick. After striking out Javy Báez and getting Nick Maton on a fly out, the rookie lefthander walked Short, the game's first baserunner.
Miguel Cabrera followed with a double — his 25th at Target Field, more than any visiting player in the stadium's history — into the corner. As Short hustled around the bases, Castro retrieved the ball and flung it to Correa, who whistled a throw toward the plate. Ryan Jeffers caught it a couple inches off the ground and simultaneously tagged Short as he slid past.
"That relay was just incredible," Headrick said.
The Tigers challenged the call, but replays confirmed the out.
"Everyone was fired up on that. It took a great relay. It took a great tag," Baldelli said. "That's the way you draw it up."
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