Joe Blanton Topic Page

Three low scoring affairs ended in a series victory for the Twins against Central division rival Cleveland Indians. On Friday night the Twins were shut out while Francisco Liriano struggled again in his second start of the season. Liriano allowed "only" 3 runs through 5 complete innings, but it could've been worse. He gave up 4 hits, walked 5 and struck out just 3. Rick Anderson and Ron Gardenhire have raved about his last two bullpen sessions, but when he goes out and struggles to find his location for 5 innings, it's hard to fully believe what they see.

Less than a week ago it looked like the Twins' season was turning around. They had won 5 straight and 8 out of 9 and were slowly closing the gap between them and the division leading Indians. Now they've suddenly lost 4 straight on their west coast road trip as their offense has managed just 6 runs in the four games. They've had two complete games thrown against them. One came on Saturday by Joe Blanton and most recently on Tuesday night against Kelvim Escobar.

For the fourth time this season, the Twins were shutout while Carlos Silva took the mound. Sadly, on all four occasions Silva pitched well enough to give the Twins the win. Silva allowed just 1 run and 5 hits through 8 innings for his longest outing of the season. However, Joe Blanton held the Twins to just 3 hits as he went the distance for Oakland. The loss snapped the Twins' 5 game winning streak.

Friday night's game was one that almost surely would not have been won with Ramon Ortiz starting. The Twins offense was able to score just 1 run off Oakland lefty Joe Kennedy in 8 innings. Kevin Slowey held down the Oakland offense through six inning and left the game with a 1-1 tie. His only flaw was a sixth inning homerun to Eric Chavez.