Minnesota Twins defeat Oakland Athletics 11-1 - MLB Update
The Minnesota Twins’ presented an outstanding performance in the club’s 11-1 win over the Oakland Athletics, at the Overstock Coliseum, on Thursday, May 19 to gain the series sweep.
The Twins’ manager Ron Gardenhire was pleased to see a much-needed triumph over the opposition.
Gardenhire said, "We've been beat up and some guys are starting to feel a little bit better. We had a fun series here.” Gardenhire was of the opinion that team needed some more improvement. “Are we out of the woods? No. We still have issues; we still have
things we have to get better at. Today was a good day for us."
Twins started the game in a positive manner as Jason Kubel led off a single off Oakland’s starter Tyson Ross in the top of the first inning to provide his team an early 1-0 lead. Oakland’s manager Bob Geren replaced Ross with David Purcey.
The move did not work as the Twins’ Rene Rivera launched a beautiful one-run homer off Purcey in the second inning for second run of the game. Purcey then retaliated in a strong manner and did not allowed a single run in next two innings.
As soon as Craig Breslow replaced Purcey in the fifth inning, the Twins’ Justin Morneau hammered a 388-feet long two-run homer to the right side of the field to take the lead to 4-0.
Then, Geren replaced Breslow with Trystan Magnuson with a hope to restrict the Twins batting. The move seemed to work as Magnuson threw a scoreless seventh inning. In the eighth inning though, he pitched loose and gave away six runs including a homer.
Michael Cuddyer, Danny Valencia and Alexi Casilla scored an RBI each to take the lead to 7-0 and then Trevor Plouffe hit a three-run homer to the left-side of the field to aggravate Magnuson’s night completely.
The game was not in favour of Oakland’s pitchers as Brad Ziegler, who relieved Magnuson in the ninth, also gave away a single to confirm his club their 22nd win of the season.
"You just try to get through 27 outs with your bullpen," Oakland manager Geren said, "It was a rough day, but we'll bounce back. This is one you just put behind you."
While the batters piled up four runs on the board, the Twins’ starter Nick Blackburn held the Athletics scoreless until the seventh inning when Mark Ellis hit a grounder to score the Athletics’ sole run in the game.
Except his run, Blackburn did not yield any run, walked two and made one strike-out over seven innings to cement his third win of the season.
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