Minneapolis – Who doesn’t enjoy seventh-inning drama? That’s what the Minnesota Twins provided on Tuesday night to a crowd of 15,358 fans, and a whole section of 20-year-old men joining the ‘Tarps Off’ fad.
The seventh inning was a universally significant marker in Minnesota’s 6-4 win over the Chicago White Sox. It was the first time in his pro baseball career that Connor Prielipp pitched into the seventh inning.
“It was really nice to go deep in the game,” Prielipp said. “I tried to help the bullpen out as much as I can, and they did a great job as well.”
Unfortunately, he allowed two singles to lead off the inning and end his night at 94 pitches. Twins manager Derek Shelton took Prielipp out of the game and handed the ball over to fellow rookie Andrew Morris. Morris had no easy task facing the top of the White Sox lineup.
The first batter he faced, Chase Meidroth, hit an RBI single. Then came Randal Grichuk, who had never seen Morris before in his young career. Morris held nothing back and threw straight heat. 98.2 MPH strike one, 97.2 MPH strike two, then to mix things up, an 82.2 MPH sweeper to throw him off balance. One down, two to go.
Next up was Miguel Vargas, one of the hottest hitters in baseball. He has a .260/.365/.575 slash line, six home runs, and 16 RBI in his last 20 games and wouldn’t make it easy for Morris. Vargas battled him to a nine-pitch at-bat with runners still on second and third.
Still, Morris prevailed. He challenged Vargas with a 99.6 MPH right down the middle, which Vargas whiffed at for out No. 2.
“I think the next fastball would have been 100, and I was a little frustrated with the execution of my offspeed pitches,” Morris said. “So yeah, and it (the fastball) was coming out good, after having a couple days off, so they were probably going to use me.”
Morris made a mistake plunking pinch-hitter Colson Montgomery with a pitch to his right knee to set up a bases-loaded situation for left-handed hitter Sam Antonacci. Shelton wasted no time calling in lefty Anthony Banda for a better matchup, and Banda delivered some gas of his own, topping out at 97.1 MPH and striking Antonacci out on a slider outside the zone.
“Banda, early in the season, was 91-92, and I think we just needed the weather to change a little bit,” said Shelton. “It’s nice. You’re seeing the transformation of our bullpen a little bit with not only the stuff but the different looks you’re getting.”
Despite the late-inning drama, Prielipp still had a solid outing after some not-so-good outings the last two times out. He went six-plus, allowed four runs, two walks, and six hits on 94 pitches while striking out seven and topping out at 97.6 MPH on his fastball.
The White Sox put Prielipp to work in the third, forcing him to throw 28 pitches and rallying for a 3-0 lead. In the next three innings, the Twins scored six runs, and Prielipp needed just 10 pitches in each to retire the Sox order. With the solid rebound from a rough early inning, Shelton felt it was the right time to let him start the seventh and see what he could do.
“No. 1, we knew at some point he was gonna have to go to that,” said Shelton. “We were gonna run him to 95 (pitches). I think he got to, what? 93, 94, and we were at 8 and 9, and the nine hitter was a lefty with no ability for them to pinch hit because of the way their bench was.”
“My last two outings weren’t great, but tonight I was able to execute,” said Prielipp. “It was just, overall, a great night for our team and me.”
Even if Prielipp came up short in the seventh, the bullpen held onto the lead and secured the 6-4 victory, with Yoendrys Gómez securing his third save of the year with Minnesota. Gómez has only allowed one earned run since the Twins acquired him on May 6 in a trade with the Tampa Bay Rays. Because of that, he has landed the high-leverage roles late in games.
“It’s very important,” Gómez said through assistant hitting coach Rayden Sierra, who translated on his behalf. “It’s a blessing; he’s very grateful for the trust and bringing him into the game in those high-leverage situations. Just trying to take advantage of all of them and do the job.”
“We’ve talked about this before: Sometimes we’ve got to pitch the sixth and the seventh to get to the ninth,” Shelton joked. “Because of that, we’ve got 11 guys with saves. So, I’m kind of screwing my mojo up with making sure guys get multiple now.”
