The Minnesota Twins got a fresh arm in Dean Kremer on Wednesday night. What they didn’t get was enough offense to back him up.
That was the story in Kansas City, where Noah Cameron once again had Minnesota’s number and the Royals slipped past the Twins 2-1 at Kauffman Stadium. Cameron held the Twins to one run and two hits across eight innings, continuing a season-long pattern that has made him look untouchable against this lineup and ordinary against everybody else.
For Minnesota, the loss marked a fourth straight defeat. It also came on a night when the club added another piece to its pitching puzzle, but still couldn’t solve the more obvious problem: the bats.
Cameron’s performance against the Twins was the kind that changes the whole shape of a game. Minnesota had a chance to crack him in the fourth inning when Josh Bell walked to start the frame and smart baserunning helped keep Kody Clemens out of a double play. Royce Lewis then stretched his career-best hitting streak to 10 games with a bunt single that loaded the bases with nobody out.
But the inning never turned into the kind of rally Minnesota needed. Victor Caratini hit a grounder up the middle that looked headed for center field, only for Bobby Witt Jr. to make a diving grab and start a double play. The Twins did score on the play to go ahead 1-0, but Cameron still escaped the inning with minimal damage, striking out Brooks Lee for one of his nine punchouts.
“Play of the game,” Twins manager Derek Shelton said.
From there, Cameron settled in and shut the door. He retired 14 straight batters to finish the night, and Minnesota never really threatened again.
Shelton called him “a little bit of a nemesis for us,” and the numbers back that up. Against the rest of the league, Cameron owns a 5.40 ERA with 88 strikeouts in 96 2/3 innings.
Against the Twins, he has a 0.67 ERA with 28 strikeouts in 27 innings.
“He had great stuff again,” Twins shortstop Ryan Kreidler said. “Executed well.
Felt like he kind of changed his usage with the changeup and the cutter a little bit, kind of where he was throwing them, when he was throwing them. … He executed again, and we just didn’t really put the bat on the ball.”
The broader picture is ugly for Minnesota, too. The Twins were the American League’s highest-scoring team before the All-Star break, but that label now belongs to the Houston Astros.
Minnesota has scored only 64 runs over its last 18 games, and 11 of those contests have featured three runs or fewer. The absence of three-time All-Star Byron Buxton has been part of that slide, with Buxton appearing in only seven games since the team returned from the break.
The struggle has been even sharper against left-handed pitching. Twins hitters now have a .655 OPS against southpaws this season, compared with a .745 mark against right-handers. That split leaves them ninth-best in baseball against righties and fourth-worst against lefties.
Cameron’s latest outing against Minnesota fit right into that story. A week earlier, he took a no-hitter into the seventh inning against the Twins before Minnesota won on Clemens’ walk-off grand slam.
This time, the left-hander didn’t need nearly that much drama. He was in command from the start and never gave the Twins a real opening after that fourth-inning wobble.
While Cameron controlled the game, Kremer gave Minnesota something it badly needed: stability on the mound. Added to the rotation Friday because the Twins didn’t want their plans blown up by a starter injury, Kremer became even more important Wednesday when Joe Ryan traveled back to Minneapolis to be evaluated by the team doctor.
Kremer delivered a solid first showing. He got the Royals out in order in the first inning, the first time on this trip that a Twins pitcher didn’t allow a run in the opening frame. He worked through four innings having faced just one batter over the minimum before Kansas City finally pressed him in the fifth.
Even then, Kremer limited the damage. He loaded the bases but allowed only a tying sacrifice fly to Kyle Isbel, then escaped the inning when Carter Jensen flied deep to end the threat. Kremer finished with one run and three hits allowed over five innings.
“They’re definitely on the peskier side,” Kremer said. “Pretty satisfied leaving with just one run after having the bases loaded with (one) out. But we came up with a plan and executed to the best of our ability and came out on top.”
The Twins’ rebuilt bullpen mostly held up behind him. A.J.
Minter gave up the difference-making blow, a go-ahead solo homer to Michael Massey in the seventh, but the rest of the relief work looked sharp. Jeff Hoffman, who arrived from the Toronto Blue Jays just a day earlier, made his debut with two strikeouts in a scoreless inning.
“I wish I could take one pitch back,” Minter said. “I thought Kremer did an unbelievable job, especially the first time, his debut here.
You couldn’t ask more out of him and even the bullpen. Just one pitch and I hate that it cost us the game.”
That one pitch mattered because Minnesota never built enough cushion. In the end, the Twins were left with another reminder that solid pitching can only carry them so far when the offense keeps disappearing.
“We’ve got to find a way, which we’ve done all year, figure out a way to create more offense, more opportunities,” Shelton said.
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