Chicago – The Minnesota Twins had a chance to play spoiler to one of Wrigley Field’s biggest ballpark celebrations on a day the Chicago Cubs unveiled their new ‘Championship Gate’ in honor of the 10th anniversary of the 2016 World Series Championship team.
Unfortunately, the magic of the 2016 team spread throughout the outfield bleachers, paying dividends to the Cubs. They had solid pitching from Matthew Boyd and some bad base-running by the Twins that halted a ninth-inning rally, leading to a 6-2 loss.
“We killed a rally there in the ninth,” said Shelton. “Boyd did a nice job. The changeup was really good. He executed it to both right-handers and left-handers and threw a ton of first-pitch strikes. We had some early count-outs. Overall, he just pitched well.”
The Twins missed an opportunity to cash in some runs in the ninth inning. Josh Bell and Victor Caratini were on first and second after a couple of singles, and Brooks Lee was at the plate. Lee hit a ball that looked as though it would be a highlight-reel catch by Pete Crow-Armstrong in right-center.
However, the ball bounced out of PCA’s glove, and Bell was just pulling up to third base with Caratini right on his heels. Lee was already three-quarters of the way to third when everyone realized what was happening.
PCA’s recovery throw made it to Miguel Amaya at home plate. Amaya threw out Bell as he retreated to third, and then Alex Bregman threw the ball back to first as Lee tried to hold back to a single, but was unfortunately tagged out.
“I saw the ball not get caught, so I assumed a double, and then I saw two runners in front of me and only two bases,” Lee said. “I think if I got back immediately, I probably would have been back there, and we only would have given up one out, but it happened.”
“We just didn’t run with our head up,” said Shelton. “That’s a ball that Josh can’t initially leave on because PCA dives forward and it hits his glove. We’ve just got to make sure we run with our head up, and we didn’t.”
Taj Bradley had a shaky first three innings against the Cubs. It started with Michael Busch’s solo home run in the bottom of the first, which he hit just over the head of Anthony Rizzo in the right-field bleachers to make it 1-0.
Then the Cubs rallied for two runs in both the second and third innings behind timely hitting and two walks drawn against Bradley. By the time Bradley left the game after the 5th inning, the Cubs had tallied five of their six runs off of seven hits and three walks.
“Overall, he struggled with his command,” said Shelton. “You know, he wasn’t as sharp early on. The fifth inning was encouraging because I do think he kind of found his delivery a little bit. He just wasn’t as sharp, and they put some balls in play that ended up going for runs that weren’t hit hard. But you’ve got to give them credit because they put them in play.”
Kody Clemens provided some spark, though. He hit two home runs off of two different lefties, Boyd and former Twins reliever Caleb Thielbar. It was the third multi-homer game of his career and the first ever against left-handed pitchers, which provided some jolt after a 0-for-19 stretch in his last five games.
“The past two days have been kind of a grind, but just trying to get back to a good spot and make sure my mechanics are back to where they were,” Clemens said. “Did some work looking at some video and stuff like that today just to make sure I was where I was.”
“Kody’s everything to the offense,” Lee said. “He’s hitting lefties; he’s hitting righties. He does a great job getting the right pitch to hit, and he doesn’t miss. It’s pretty cool to see. Yesterday he didn’t have his best game. It looked like he felt a lot better today, and I feel like he’s just going to continue to make adjustments and be really good for us.”
The Twins’ loss puts them back below .500 at 49-50. Zebby Matthews will start Sunday’s rubber match against the Cubs against lefty Shota Imanaga.
