MINNEAPOLIS – The Royals started with a bang Saturday afternoon with Carter Jensen’s leadoff home run in the top of the first inning and ended with a comeback inning and big milestone for Bobby Witt Jr. in the ninth inning to give them a 3-2 win over the Twins at Target Field.
After the Twins broke the tie and took the lead on Orlando Arcia’s pinch-hit homer off reliever Matt Strahm in the eighth inning, the Royals immediately responded in the top of the ninth. Isaac Collins singled, pinch-runner Tyler Tolbert stole second and somehow stayed safe on Josh Rojas’ fielder’s choice back to Twins reliever Eric Orze. Both baserunners moved up on Kyle Isbel’s sacrifice bunt.
Tolbert raced home on Jensen’s sacrifice fly, and Rojas scored on Bobby Witt Jr.’s single into left field – the go-ahead run marking Witt’s 400th career RBI. Just over a week until Witt’s 26th birthday, he became the fifth MLB player with 400-plus RBIs and 150-plus stolen bases before age 26 since RBIs became official in 1920.
In between those two innings? Not a lot of offense, but that ended up being OK with the pitching performance the Royals received from starter Luinder Avila’s five innings of one-run ball and their bullpen. Outside of the pitch from Strahm that Arcia put in the left-field seats in the eighth inning, the Royals largely held the Twins quiet.
It started with Avila, who is quickly showing his value now as a member of the rotation.
Avila held the Twins hitless through his first four innings and faced one over the minimum entering the fifth, walking two batters but getting a double play that erased one of them in the third. Austin Martin lined a single up the middle for the Twins’ first hit leading off the fifth, and the Twins quickly loaded the bases with no outs with a double and a walk.
Tristan Gray’s sacrifice fly tied the game, but it could have been a much bigger inning for Avila and the Royals. Instead, Avila got Ryan Kreidler to chop a ball right back to him on the mound, turning coolly around to second base to start the double play.
The high-stress inning marked the end of Avila’s day as the Royals turned it over to the bullpen. Avila is still working his way up to a full starter’s workload and was limited to the 75-80 range; he ended Saturday at 70 pitches after five innings with the full strength of the Royals’ high-leverage bullpen available. Alex Lange closed out the victory for his third save in the Royals' last four games.