Gio Urshela returned from paternity leave to give his newborn daughter a very special, albeit a little belated, birthday gift.
With the Twins tied with Detroit in the bottom of the 10th inning Monday night, Urshela stepped up to the plate with two outs and plopped a winning two-run homer over the center field wall, giving his team a 5-3 victory. It was the first walkoff homer of his career.
"She's doing really good. Excited to have her in the house," Urshela said of baby girl Gianna — a combination of Urshela's and his wife Danna's names. "She's healthy, and I managed to help the team."
Urshela — a generally soft-spoken guy — showed some rare exuberance as he rounded the bases to solidify a much-needed victory in front of an announced 20,231 fans at Target Field. He even took Luis Arraez dousing him with cold Gatorade with a big smile.
The comeback helped the Twins (54-48) maintain a one-game lead in the AL Central over Cleveland, which beat Arizona 6-5 in 11 innings. And even more satisfying, it came despite a bench shortage.
For the final three innings against the last-place Tigers (41-63), the Twins resorted to Tim Beckham in left field, a recent call-up who has 13 games of major league experience there, all in 2019. Beckham only came in after Alex Kirilloff had contributed three innings in the outfield, since his persisting wrist injury prevents him from swinging. And that only happened because Kyle Garlick left the game after his at-bat in the fourth inning, where he struck out.
Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said Garlick has been in "severe pain" with a neck/rib issue since Friday's game at San Diego. But without Max Kepler (broken toe), Gilberto Celestino (paternity leave) and Byron Buxton (out of the lineup for a day because of his season-long knee injury), Garlick had to suit up. Baldelli said Garlick will have a magnetic resonance imaging exam to make sure he doesn't have a broken rib or any other damage.
"We had to do a lot of different things in this game just to get through the game. One of those was to play a guy that couldn't swing in left field for two or three innings because he's the most experienced outfielder that was able to go in," Baldelli said, adding catcher Caleb Hamilton was another potential last resort.
The tight bench might have contributed to the Twins' early offensive lethargy. Detroit starter Tarik Skubal held the Twins scoreless for his five innings, as did the first two relievers out of the pen for their one inning apiece, Will Vest and Joe Jimenez.
Twins spot starter Aaron Sanchez pitched solid five innings, giving up just four hits and two walks with eight strikeouts. Detroit scored a pair of runs off him, both coming off Tucker Barnhart's bat.
But the Twins pounced on Tigers reliever Michael Fulmer in the eighth, stringing together three consecutive base hits from Jorge Polanco, Carlos Correa and Arraez at the top of the order to load the bases. Jose Miranda then tied the game with a two-run single.
The Twins nearly won it in the ninth inning, but Nick Gordon was caught off third base on a ball four to Carlos Correa that would have loaded the bases. Instead, former Twins prospect Akil Baddoo put Detroit ahead in the top of the 10th with his RBI single off reliever Griffin Jax, but Miranda tied the score again with a base hit in the bottom of the inning. Then he scored on Urshela's homer.
"The moment he hit it, I knew it was gone," Miranda said. "So it was fun, especially for him, first game coming back after [the baby]. So it was pretty cool."
