Edwin Jackson Topic Page

The Twins snapped their 2-game skid with a convincing win that was broken open with a 5-run seventh inning for the Twins. Edwin Jackson and Francisco Liriano had been dueled to a 1-1 tie in the preceding six innings.

Liriano put together his best start of the season, allowing 2 runs on just 4 hits and 3 walks. More importantly, he struck out a season high 9 batters, which is tied for the most since his dominate stint in 2006. In terms of innings pitched, it was also his most successful effort of the year. After witnessing Scott Baker's sudden collapse on Sunday afternoon, Ron Gardenhire wasted no time pullling Liriano when he ran into trouble in the eighth inning (the pitch count of 103 had a lot to do with it too).

The Twins and D-rays split a 4-game set in their first meeting at the Metrodome early in the year. The Twins were lucky to escape with one of the wins as they relied on a top of the ninth inning brain cramp from Carl Crawford and bottom of the ninth walk-off from Justin Morneau to escape with a 3-2 victory.

The Tampa Bay Devil Rays will come to the Metrodome for a four game series beginning on Thursday. They've lost 4 of their last five games, but are coming off a 6-5 victory against the Rangers on Wednesday night. They split their opening series with the Yankees last week. The D-rays are known as the perennial cellar-dwellers of the AL Eeast, but they might be starting to build up a better team (though they're not there yet).