Minnesota Twins Experience Replay Twice, Win Twice In Split-Squad Action
Credit: Tommy Gilligan-USA TODAY Sports
The Minnesota Twins won twice today, but that’s not the story of the day, they used replay twice. The Toronto Blue Jays initiated the first instant replay challenge in the history of Major League Baseball on a play that might have pulled the Jays first baseman off the bag in the sixth inning. The call on the field was that he was off the bag, the review agreed, but there’s still doubt if it was the right call. The review took 2:34.
The second challenge occurred on a Doug Bernier infield single that was a bang-bang play. The call on the field was ruled as safe and it was upheld. This review took 2:03.
Scoring started quickly for the Twins on Monday against the Blue Jays. Aaron Hicks got on base with a single to lead off the Twins first, Brian Dozier hit a double down the left field line and that’s when it gets fun. As Hicks was trying to score the cutoff man threw the ball past the catcher and with no one backing up the catcher, Dozier came around to score on the error.
Toronto starter J.A. Happ struggled mightly. He only retired one man, faced seven and walked four. That includes the walking in of a run. Jermaine Mitchell also added a sac fly to give the Twins four runs in the first.
The Jays only score came on a two-run blast by Edwin Encarnacion in the fourth inning.
It was a rough day for the Jays. They walked in another run in the seventh and had a blunder in the outfield, too. Right fielder Kenny Wilson lost an easy pop-fly in the sun and it scored three more for the Twins to highlight another four run inning.
Kevin Correia started the game for the Twins and pitched two wonderful innings. Correia only gave up one walk and no hits in his outing. Brian Duensing came in and gave up the two-run homer in his one inning of work. Kyle Gibson came in for three innings of work, gave up two hits with two strikeouts. Casey Fien and Caleb Theilbar also pitched an inning a piece in the contest.
Jermaine Mitchell was impressive for the Twins. Mitchell was only a triple shy of the cycle playing the whole split-squad game in left field. Brian Dozier went 2-for-3 on the day with two doubles in continuance of his hot early spring.
In the other split-squad game, the Twins faced the Baltimore Orioles and the game was tied going into the ninth inning. Then the Twins went off for seven runs to win that contest by a score of 9-2. A combined score of 21-4 on the day for the Twins. Twins now are 4-1 for Grapefruit League play.
Twins play at the Miami Marlins on Tuesday. Game time is noon central.