CHICAGO – While the Twins were on their way to a 11-1 victory over the White Sox on Sunday, Cleveland star Trevor Bauer was melting down at Kansas City, throwing a ball from the mound over the center field wall after giving up seven runs during a 9-6 loss.
The Twins won. The Indians lost. That is significant.
That meant the Twins gained a game on the Indians in the AL Central race for the first time since winning in Cleveland on July 14. Astoundingly, it's the first time the Twins have gained a game on the Indians outside of head-to-head competition since June 29. The Twins, who once led the division by 11½ games, take a two-game lead to Miami for a series with the Marlins that starts Tuesday.
"Every once in a while you look up and look at all the scores because they're up every day when we're out there playing," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. "You might look up and take a peek at what's going on. But it doesn't affect our team, affect anything we're doing. Generally, I think the right way to think about it is, if you go out there and handle your own business and do it well, you're going to be in good shape."
The Twins will head for South Beach and other attractions after taking three of four vs. a White Sox team with talent inferior to theirs.
Veteran reliever Sergio Romo, acquired in a trade with Miami on Saturday, flew to Chicago to meet his new teammates and make himself available if needed. He wasn't. Instead, he watched what the Twins were all about, as Jorge Polanco, Miguel Sano, Jonathan Schoop and Max Kepler all went deep. Righthander Kyle Gibson pitched six solid innings and the Twins beat the White Sox for the seventh time in 10 meetings.
"He came in after the game and was like, 'Man, this is kind of fun,' " Gibson said. "So if we keep scoring 11 runs every time he's here, he can stay around, that's for sure."
It began with five runs on 14 pitches thrown by White Sox righthander Dylan Covey, who was yanked five batters into the game without recording an out.
Kepler doubled on Covey's first pitch. Three pitches later, Polanco clobbered a two-run homer to right-center. Nelson Cruz and Luis Arraez each hit a single before Sano launched a 2-1 pitch over the right field wall to put the Twins ahead 5-0.
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2019 Twins statistics
And that was all for Covey, who fell to 1-7 with a 6.99 ERA and was sent to the minors after the game. Many among the announced crowd of 27,595 booed Covey off the field. Gibson had a nice cushion to work with.
Gibson (10-4) got out of a two-on, two-out jam in the first inning and cruised until the sixth, when he loaded the bases and gave up an RBI single to Jon Jay. But he got a beneficial called strike three on Elon Jimenez — White Sox manager Rick Renteria was ejected protesting umpire Angel Hernandez's call — and escaped the inning without further damage. In six innings, Gibson gave up one run on seven hits and one walk with nine strikeouts.
The Twins kept adding on, getting a two-run double from Cruz in the fourth, a two-run homer from Schoop in the fifth and two-run homer from Kepler in the eighth.
Start fast and keep adding on. Makes for a stress-free afternoon before heading south.
"That's something that you try to muster up," Baldelli said. "There's no one way to do it. You can't force yourself or will yourself into hitting balls on the barrel or scoring runs. You just maintain that consistent good, quality approach throughout the game. Don't get content in any way and keep doing what we're doing."
