Joe Mauer’s first homer of 2015 leads Twins to sweep in Pittsburgh
Take a look around the league with Big League Stew’s daily wrap up. We’ll hit on all of the biggest moments from the day that you may have missed, while providing highlights, photos and interesting stats.
Joe Mauer’s long-running power drought is over, and he could not have possibly picked a better time to snap it. With the Twins and Pirates tied in the 13th inning at PNC Park, Mauer smacked Antonio Bastardo’s 0-1 pitch into right field bleachers for a go-ahead solo home run that held up as the difference in Minnesota’s 4-3 victory.
The home run was Mauer’s first of the season. In fact, it was his first since Aug. 17 of last year, which covers a span of 76 games and 322 plate appearances. But you’d hardly know that based on the swing or the result. Looking comfortable against a left-handed pitcher, Mauer turned on the pitch like we’ve seen so many times in the past and gave it a ride.
Vintage Mauer, you might say, and as a result the Twins are now a comfortable six games over .500.
The home run helped Minnesota avoid what could have been a difficult loss to swallow. After jumping out to a 3-0 lead in the first inning, the offense went silent allowing Pittsburgh to chip away before tying it in the eighth on Andrew McCutchen’s home run. After sweeping the brief two-game series, Minnesota will move on to Chicago for a weekend series with the White Sox.
ASTROS KEEP ROLLING IN AL WEST
One slip up against the Oakland A’s on Monday is all that stands between the Houston Astros and an eight-game winning streak. This comes less than three weeks after Houston won 10 straight, including sweeps against those same A’s, the San Diego Padres and Seattle Mariners.
It goes without saying that they remain the biggest surprise in MLB this season, and with Wednesday’s 6-1 win against Oakland, they maintained the second-best record in MLB behind only the St. Louis Cardinals.
On the pitching side, Dallas Keuchel has been the foundation of their hot start. He improved to 6-0 Wednesday, pitching seven innings and allowing just one unearned run. He joins Cardinals’ right-hander Michael Wacha as the only pitchers with at least six decision to remain undefeated. Felix Hernandez and Bartolo Colon also have six victories.
Offensively, it was another balanced attack. George Springer, Marwin Gonzalez and Jake Marisnick each had two hits, but the biggest came from Evan Gattis. His go-ahead two-run homer in the fifth was Houston’s league-leading 61st long ball of the season and the blow Oakland simply couldn’t recover from.
Also worth noting, Jose Altuve was 0-for-5. He’s mired in a 2-for-20 slump over his last five games, but the Astros continue picking him up.
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MARLINS STILL WINLESS IN DAN JENNINGS ERA
The Dan Jennings era is off to a miserable start in Miami and Wednesday’s 6-1 loss to the Arizona Diamondbacks was another befiting of the chaos and apparent lack of direction or organization that engulfs the franchise.
The Marlins were carved up by Arizona rookie Chase Anderson, who allowed just one run on four hits over eight innings. That continued a brutal stretch on offense, but Miami was no better defensively, committing an error and permitting six D-Backs stolen bases. A.J. Pollock paced the aggressive attack with three steals, including a steal of home on a botched rundown. Tuffy Gosewisch, Nick Ahmad and Aaron Hill each swiped one bag as Miami could find no answers.
Of the six steals, five led to runs. Pollock reached four times overall and touched home all four times. David Peralta knocked him in on three occasions.
The Marlins are now 0-3 under Jennings after being swept in Mike Redmond’s final three games against Atlanta. They have one more against Arizona before welcoming the Baltimore Orioles this weekend.
LINCECUM SILENCES DODGERS WITH VINTAGE OUTING
Apparently Wednesday was a night for vintage performances. Aside from David Letterman’s heartfelt goodbye on the Late Show and Joe Mauer’s first home run since 2014, San Francisco Giants right-hander Tim Lincecum was pretty close to his Cy Young form in helping his squad shut out the Los Angeles Dodgers 4-0.
Through not necessarily overpowering, Lincecum had Los Angeles off balance for the duration of his seven innings, allowing just three hits. He walked two, another encouraging number, and struck out four, which helped keep the pitch count manageable.
Jean Machi, Javier Lopez and Jeremy Affeldt recorded the final six outs as San Francisco extended its winning to five and moved to within 2 1/2 games of Los Angeles. Buster Posey had three hits, including a two-run homer off Yimi Garcia.
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Mark Townsend is a writer for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter! Follow @Townie813
