Connor Prielipp looked every bit the power arm the Twins have been waiting to see on Saturday - until one crooked inning wrecked the whole thing.
Back home at Target Field after the Field of Dreams Game, Minnesota got a start that flashed both sides of the rookie left-hander: electric stuff, real poise, and then a fifth inning that spun completely off the rails. Prielipp said it plainly afterward: “The stuff wasn’t the problem tonight,” Prielipp said. “It was just a lack of command.”
For four innings, he held the Phillies to one run. Then came the fifth, when the strike zone disappeared. Prielipp walked three straight hitters and watched Bryson Stott launch a three-run homer that blew the game open.
“We've just got to put the ball on the plate,” Twins manager Derek Shelton said. “I don't think there was anything that stood out.
It wasn't just one pitch. He just lost command of pretty much everything.”
The early innings, though, were a showcase.
Prielipp opened the game against a nasty Phillies top of the order - Kyle Schwarber, Trea Turner and Bryce Harper - a trio that entered the day with 79 home runs and 191 RBIs this season. He handled all three like a pitcher who knew exactly what he wanted to do.
Schwarber was first, and Prielipp beat him with a 96.5 mph sinker up in the zone before getting a routine groundout to second. Turner followed and saw a 97 mph four-seamer for a strike, then a 96.2 mph heater fouled away, before a slider at 88.8 mph dropped into the bottom of the zone for strike three. Harper fell behind 2-0, but Prielipp worked back and finished him with a 96.8 mph four-seamer at the top of the zone.
That was a big first inning for a Twins team that had allowed 12 runs in its last 10 games in that frame.
Prielipp showed a different kind of maturity in the second. The Phillies loaded the bases with no outs on a soft single by Luis Arraez, a booming double by Alec Bohm and a four-pitch walk to Edmundo Sosa.
He bent, but didn’t break, allowing only a sacrifice fly to J.T. Realmuto before getting out of the inning.
The next trip through the order brought more of the same, plus a little something extra. Prielipp struck out Schwarber with a slider and Turner with a curveball in the dirt. Harper then punched a curveball into left field, but Austin Martin erased the hit by throwing Harper out at second to end the inning.
Then came the fifth, and the whole outing changed.
Prielipp got two of the first three hitters, but he couldn’t finish the inning. The next six Phillies reached: three walks, then back-to-back singles, then Stott’s three-run blast. That was the turning point.
“I felt pretty good the whole start. It just got out of hand somehow,” said Prielipp, who walked four batters for the second time in his last three starts.
“I was just missing. Then as soon as I did throw a strike, they were able to capitalize.”
Even with the ugly finish, the rookie sees it as part of the process. He said the challenge now is to keep the rough patch from swallowing the rest of what was, for the most part, a strong outing.
“In this game, there’s going to be a lot of ups and downs,” he said. “The best thing I’ve learned is just to have a short memory, and that’s all I’m going to do after this one.”
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