At the halfway point of a regular season mostly being played in order to secure a much-needed postseason payoff for MLB, it seemed appropriate that so many factors paid off for the Twins in a tense 3-2 victory over Cleveland on Monday.
Going the opposite way with a pitch paid off for Miguel Sano, who hadn't homered in that direction in more than a year. Sticking with an unruly slider paid off for Sergio Romo, who put the tying run in scoring position, then tiptoed out of trouble.
And Kenta Maeda, the prospect-for-veteran gamble that has paid off splendidly for the Twins thus far, earned his fourth win and the biggest payout of the night: Nearly half a million dollars.
Add it up, and the Twins reached the halfway point of this virus-abbreviated season with 20 wins, just the second AL team to get there, and a 2 { game lead over Cleveland in the AL Central. At 20-10, the Twins are living up to their lock-for-the-playoffs preseason billing.
Nobody is meeting expectations more robustly than Maeda, though. The Japanese righthander, who lost his no-hitter in the ninth inning of his last start, this time surrendered it, and his shutout, just three pitches into the game, when leadoff hitter Cesar Hernandez drilled a mid-plate slider into the right-center seats, the second day in a row he had opened a game with a home run. That's the first time in Cleveland's 120-year MLB history anyone has done that.
But Maeda, allowed to throw 115 pitches in his no-hit bid last week, responded by facing 20 more hitters over five innings, allowing none of them to score, and throwing a more normal 83 pitches to do it, relieving his new employers.
The Twins had difficulty doing much damage to Cleveland righthander Aaron Civil, who made only a couple of mistakes. But they were similar, and they were enough.
First, Nelson Cruz fought off a two-strike outside fastball in the fourth inning, with a swing that normally produces a foul ball. Cruz's strength, though, blasted the ball nearly 400 feet into the right-field seats, tying him with Chicago's Jose Abreu for the AL lead with 11 homers, and moving him up to 54th all-time with 412.
Two innings later, after Eddie Rosario doubled off Civale, Sano imitated Cruz's approach, crushing an outside pitch not far from Cruz's, a two-run shot that marked Sano's first opposite-field home run since last Aug. 17 in Detroit.
The Twins got no other runs, but Maeda and the bullpen made it hold up. Caleb Thielbar left two runners on by striking out Roberto Perez. Trevor May allowed three hits and a run, but struck out Franmil Reyes with the tying run at third. And Sergio Romo allowed a leadoff double to Tyler Naquin, fell behind 3-0 to Perez, but ultimately stuck with the slider to strike out Greg Allen and escape.
Taylor Rogers pitched a scoreless ninth to earn his seventh save.
Maeda, now 4-0 with a 2.21 ERA, reached the first bonus clauses of his unusual, incentive-laden contract on Monday. By making his sixth start, the prorated performance level of 15 starts in a normal year, he will be paid $370,370, rather than $1 million. By compiling 33 1/3 innings, he gets $92,592, the same bonus he'll get for every 3 2/3 innings for the rest of the season.
That's an extra $462,962 for his outing on Monday. Plus, a Twins' victory.
