The Twins were running out of time to find a spark, and Monday night they got one from a pair of unlikely places. Austin Martin jump-started the offense with a solo homer, and Dean Kremer turned in a brilliant outing against the Orioles, his former team, as Minnesota rolled to a 9-5 win.
Martin broke through in the third inning, driving a solo shot to left-center for his third homer of the season and his first since May 22nd. For a player who has struggled badly since his hot start with the Twins this spring, it was the kind of swing Minnesota needed in a stretch that had gone sideways.
That early lead didn’t last long. Baltimore answered in the fourth on an odd sequence: Kremer struck out the batter, but the Orioles turned it into a strike-em-out, throw-em-out double play that let Gunnar Henderson score from third on the throw to second. Just like that, the game was tied 1-1.
From there, Kremer took over.
Facing the Orioles for the first time since the trade deadline deal that brought him to Minnesota, he looked dialed in from the jump. He allowed only one hit, an infield single, over seven innings, while walking one and striking out seven. Even more telling, he piled up 14 swings and misses and gave the Twins exactly what they needed most: length.
Minnesota’s bullpen had been getting hammered during a run of tight games, so seven innings from Kremer mattered just as much as the quality of the outing itself.
The Twins got the lead back in the fourth when rookie Kaelen Culpepper lifted a sacrifice fly to score Luke Keaschall and make it 2-1. Baltimore stayed close for a while, but the game finally cracked open in the seventh.
That’s when Minnesota put together its biggest inning of the night, a five-run burst that started with an RBI single from Ryan Jeffers. Then Josh Bell delivered the swing that really blew it open, hammering a three-run homer that left the bat at 106 MPH and gave the Twins a 7-1 cushion. It was Bell’s 16th homer of the season and his third in the past week.
The offense kept going in the eighth. Jeffers added an RBI double, and Royce Lewis followed with an RBI single to stretch the lead to 9-1.
It was the kind of production Minnesota had been missing during its recent skid. The Twins finished with 14 hits, five extra-base hits, and their highest run total since July 26th.
Baltimore scratched out a couple of runs against Travis Adams in the eighth and Taylor Rogers in the ninth, but the outcome was never in doubt by then. Minnesota had already done enough for a 9-5 victory.
The win opened the series the right way for the Twins and nudged them closer in the American League Wild Card race. They’re now one game out of the final spot, with plenty of season left to play.
Most of all, it gave Minnesota something it had been chasing: a complete night. Martin set the tone early, the offense finally broke loose, and Kremer delivered one of the best starts of his career against the team he just left behind. After losing six of their previous eight, the Twins will try to keep that momentum going Tuesday night.
In Other News...
Joe Ryan Is Giving The Twins A Problem They Can't Ignore
Joe Ryan has long been one of the more important arms in the Twins rotation, but the late-season picture around him has gotten murkier at exactly the wrong time. His second-half track record has become hard to overlook, and recent poor outings only added to the concern after a stint on the injured list because of a glute strain. For a team trying to stay steady through a playoff push, that kind of uncertainty around a frontline pitcher is a real problem.
The Twins have already started building around the possibility that they cannot count on Ryan the same way they once could, which helps explain the addition of Dean Kremer for rotation depth. Even beyond the stretch run, Ryans situation now carries an offseason angle, since the club may have to weigh trade possibilities if the fit keeps getting harder to trust. The catch is that his recent struggles could also make that conversation more complicated, leaving Minnesota with a pitcher who still matters, but no longer feels easy to project. [Read more 🡒]
Yankees May Have A Catching Target Back In Play Soon
Ryan Jeffers was one of the more closely watched names around the deadline, and it was not hard to understand why. The Twins catcher drew significant trade interest before the deadline, with Minnesota ultimately deciding to keep him in place while general manager Jeremy Zoll pointed to Jeffers value both for the current club and for what comes next.
Now the storyline could circle back in a different way, because the market that checked in on him before the deadline may not be done paying attention. Jeffers is still positioned as a possible move for the future if the Twins cannot keep him, and the next step in his contract situation could put his name back into the middle of the offseason catching discussion. [Read more 🡒]
Twins Suddenly Have A Tough Emmanuel Rodriguez Decision Ahead
Emmanuel Rodriguez has become one of the more intriguing names in the Twins system, but his path to Minnesota is getting harder to map by the day. The young outfielder still carries real upside, yet the combination of a crowded big-league outfield picture and his own injury history has made every step toward the majors feel more complicated than it should.
The bigger issue now is timing, because the Twins are heading into a stretch where roster choices, possible trades and Rodriguezs own health and performance will all matter. He has to keep pushing forward while the organization weighs how much room there really will be for him, and the answer could shape whether his future still runs through Minnesota or somewhere else. [Read more 🡒]