Mets Beat Twins
The Mets were back in Minnesota Monday afternoon for a make-up game of their snowed-out game in April. Well, there was another type of blizzard — a blizzard of hits as the Mets beat the Twins.
The Mets jumped all over Twins starter Kyle Gibson. Eric Young led off the game with a single up the middle. Daniel Murphy followed with a single of his own. After Marlon Byrd struck out, Ike Davis walked to load the bases. Andrew Brown singled to score Young to make it 1-0. But the Mets let Gibson off the hook; Wilmer Flores grounded into a double play to end the inning.
The Mets went back to business in the second — both in getting hits and helping to bail out Gibson. With one out Juan Lagares singled when a ground ball got caught in the webbing of the third baseman’s glove. Omar Quintanilla singled to put runners on first and second. Young then singled again to plate Lagares to make it 2-0. However, Quintanilla got caught off second base and was tagged out in a rundown. Murphy grounded out for the third out. Quintanilla’s blunder may have run the Mets out of a bigger inning.
Flores led off the fourth inning with a double. Travis d’Arnaud walked (his fifth walk in three games). Lagares stupidly tried to sacrifice, however it was a perfect bunt down the third base line that went for a hit to load the bases with no outs. Quintanilla singled to make it 3-0. Still with the bases loaded, Young hit a sinking liner to third. Trevor Plouffe caught the ball and then dove to the bag, just doubling off d’Arnaud. But Gibson could not catch a break this time — Murphy singled to plate another run to make it 4-0. That was all for Gibson, who allowed a whopping 10 hits in 3.2 innings. Anthony Swarzak came on and got Byrd to ground out.
Flores made it 5-0 in the seventh when he singled in a run.
The Twins finally got on the board in the bottom of the seventh when Murphy booted a grounder and a runner scored from second.
Dillon Gee shut down the Twins, going 7.2 innings, allowing just that one unearned run on six hits. He struck out nine Twins and walked one batter.
Byrd hit his 20th home run of the season into the upper deck in left to make it 6-1.
The Mets pounded out 14 hits as they win 6-1.