The Twins may be realistically be out of the playoff hunt, but Johan Santana demonstrated on Sunday why it pays to keep watching this team anyway. Johan struck out 17 Ranger batters through 8 innings on Sunday. Interesting notes about the event:

• Santana surpassed his previous career high of 14 strikeouts in a start.
• Santana broke the old Twins’ record of 15 strikeouts in a start shared by Bert Blyleven (1986), Jerry Koosman (1980), Joe Decker (1973) and Camilo Pascual (1961).
• The outing was baseball’s best strikeout performance since Ben Sheets struck out 18 Braves in May 2004.
• Only one man, Randy Johnson, has struck out more batters through eight innings. That was done in 1992 and took an incredible 160 pitches to accomplish.
• I calculated Johan’s Game Score to be 95 which would be tied for 3rd best in Twins’ history behind Eric Milton’s 1999 no hitter (GmSc 98) and Bert Blyleven’s 1975 11 inning shutout (GmSc 97).

Johan ultimately had to be pulled after 8 innings with a pitch count of a 112, but it sure would’ve been fun to see him keep going. He completed his game by striking out the side in both the seventh and eighth innings.

Johan allowed just 2 hits, both to Sammy Sosa. Sosa missed a home run by just a few feet down the left field line before getting his second hit a couple swings later. What made the performance even more impressive is that Santana had to do what he did to win. The Twins’ offense again failed to do much with Michael Cuddyer’s second inning home run being the only production for the Twins.

Miraculously the Twins managed a 2-1 series victory despite being outscored 6-3 in the series by Texas. Both Cleveland and Detroit lost on Sunday putting the Twins 6 games behind Cleveland for the division lead (same place they stood coming into the weekend) and 4.5 games behind second place Detroit. They’ll now host the Wild card leading Mariners, who hold an 8 game lead over the Twins.

Game Notes

• Santana won only his 13th game of the season, putting his record at 13-9. He dropped his ERA back down below 3 to 2.88. He still trails Erik Bedard for the MLB strikeout lead by 207 to 191.
• Justin Morneau was 0-1 at the plate but drew 3 walks.
• Kevin Millwood allowed just 4 hits, but walked 5 Twins through 7 innings.
• Joe Mauer capped off a hitless weekend with an 0-4 Sunday at the plate.
• Michael Cuddyer provided the only RBI with his 12th home run of the season in the second inning.
• Joe Nathan recorded his 27th save of the season and also struck out 2 batters of his own in the ninth to give the Twins a total of 19 K’s on the day.

Finally, what Terry Ryan should be handing Johan tonight: