Phillies Close Series by Opening Up on Twins
By Matt Veasey
3. 2. 7. 6. Final
The Philadelphia Phillies defeated the host Minnesota Twins at Target Field on Thursday afternoon.
The Phillies offense finally opened up again, something they tend to do about once every week or so. As a result, the Phils downed the Twins by a 7-3 score to put an end to a nine game losing streak.
Ryan Howard homered early and Freddy Galvis homered late to support the solid starting pitching effort of Jerad Eickhoff in this afternoon affair at Target Field. For ‘The Big Piece’ this game marked his first multi-hit effort in a month and a half.
Eickhoff (5-9) went six innings over which he allowed just five hits and a walk and struck four batters out. Severino Gonzalez and Hector Neris followed with scoreless frames before closer Jeanmar Gomez was touched for a run and two hits in a non-Save situation.
With the Phils trailing 1-0, Howard got the team on the board by blasting his 11th home run of the season to center field on a full count offering from Twins starter Ricky Nolasco.
The Phillies would generally rope Nolasco (3-5) around for 10 hits and four earned runs over his 6.2 innings. Nolasco also walked four batters, and threw just 63 strikes in his 106 pitches.
With the Phillies up 4-2 in the top of the 8th and former Twins closer Kevin Jepsen on for the home side, Cody Asche singled with one out and Cesar Hernandez followed by drawing a walk.
That set up Galvis, who just like Howard drove a full count offering out of the yard, this one a deep shot to right field. The three-run homer put the Phils up 7-2 and pretty much put the game out of reach.
It also put a capper on a huge game from the deservedly criticized Phillies middle infielders. Galvis and Hernandez combined to go 6-7 on the day with four runs scored and five runs batted in.
Over the course of the three games in Minnesota, the Phillies offense produced 22 runs. However, we all knew coming in that this was perhaps the worst pitching rotation and overall staff that the club might face all season.
The Phillies will now fly out to the left coast for the first time this season, visiting the NL West-leading San Francisco Giants. The Giants are twenty games over .500, lead their division by six games, and have the third best record in all of baseball.