Delmon Young!

I owe him a debt of gratitude, as he ended the Twins' losing streak of games attended by the funky barracuda at four while extending the Twins' winning streak to a season high five games. It was a great game to watch... after the fourth inning.

Gabino performed as expected: really shaky. Lots of hits, a few walks, one strikeout. His one good inning (the first) limited the damage, though Phil Humber once again made Bill Smith look dumb before Bobby Keppel turned in not a scoreless, but decent enough effort before the Twins pounced on the O's bullpen. That's probably the biggest seperator between contending teams like the Twins and basement rats like the O's: middle relief. Jesse Crain could probably close or setup for the O's, but for the Twins he's a middle reliever, and thank the gods for that. He shut the O's down before giving up a leadoff double that Jose Mijares brilliantly stranded with a couple of popups and a strikeout. The O's weren't able to keep it a tie game.

Delmon Young's on a nice tear right now. Tonight he accounted for three Twins' runs, including the walk-off single. I'd still rather have Garza starting the game with Bartlett batting second, but it's encouraging that Young seems to be turning a corner. The next corner will hopefully include drawing some more walks. And somehow get the Tigers to lose. Still 4.5 back, but it's a lot smaller 4.5 than it used to be.