Detroit Tigers right-hander Jordan Zimmermann continued his red-hot start to the season, pitching seven innings of one-run ball as the Tigers beat the Minnesota Twins 4-1 on Saturday.
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Minnesota Twins’ Brian Dozier tosses his bat after striking out against Detroit Tigers starting pitcher Jordan Zimmermann (27) during the fifth inning of a baseball game in Minneapolis, Saturday, April 30, 2016.
Hughes lasted a season-low five innings, allowing seven hits and four earned runs.
With two on and two outs, Duffey tried to get ahead in the count with a first-pitch fastball. Ausmus was hoping something would click if he adjusted the lineup, and Detroit broke through with four runs in the second. “It’s a pretty good recipe for failure”. “That mistake is a lot larger when you’ve got a guy like Zimmermann throwing against you”. “That’s just one of those things that put us in a hole, but I did everything I could to keep us in it. It just wasn’t enough”. Byung Ho Park (.241, 8 Rs, 5 HRs, 7 RBIs) went 1 for 3 Wednesday with one run, one home run, and two RBIs. His ERA actually rose to 0.55 as he became the first Tigers pitcher to win five games in April since Frank Tanana in 1988, according to STATS.
He kept the Twins off-balance from the outset but perhaps most impressively, worked his way out of a fourth inning jam after allowing three consecutive two-out singles. Other Tigers pitching prospects have had better first starts without it translating into career success – Kyle Ryan pitched six shutout innings in 2014 and is now a long reliever, while highly touted Andy Van Hekken threw a shutout in his 2002 debut and never won another game.
By the time the fourth inning came to merciful close, Bassitt was gone and the Tigers had a lead they would not relinquish.
“I had guys 0-2 and make bad pitches and they get hits and fall behind another hitter and they get hits”, Bassitt said.
The Tigers (0-0) roared for three runs in the eighth inning and two runs in the ninth inning.
On Saturday, the Twins were just 1-for-10 against Zimmermann’s fastball.
Before the Upton home run, J.D. Martinez reached on a questionable error by Eduardo Escobar at third base, and Victor Martinez doubled.
Duffey said he was anxious about Murphy’s safety if Upton hadn’t connected in the first inning. Detroit is clearly the better team here and while Zimmermann is due for a blow up I don’t see it here against the light hitting Twins. “I don’t remember a start like this, where every breaking ball I threw was terrible and I couldn’t locate anything”. C James McCann was to catch nine innings at Toledo Friday as he works his way back from a right-ankle sprain. Twins 3B Trevor Plouffe left for a rehabilitation assignment to Class A Fort Myers this weekend. Manager Paul Molitor indicated that RHP Kyle Gibson, on the DL since April 23 with a right shoulder strain, probably won’t come off when he’s eligible, but was optimistic Gibson wouldn’t miss much more time than that. Barring any setbacks, he is expected to join the Twins in Houston on Tuesday. Pelfrey spent the past three seasons in Minnesota.
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Sonny Gray (3-2) lasted only two innings in the shortest start of his big league career. With the rest of the AL West idle, the A’s fell to 4th in the tight division, 1.5 games back from the division-leading Texas Rangers.
