Good pitching beats good hitting - Dennis Lane took the mound for the Dodgers and used pinpoint control and a combination of speeds to quiet a good Twins batting order. Over five innings, Lane allowed only three baserunners - two singles and one walk.
Defense wins championships (or regular season games) - The Dodgers did not commit an error. Marc Trinchillo - filling in for an injured Harvey Staulters - was very smooth at SS. Dan Maguire in LF and Joe Careccia in CF made the easy plays and ran down a few fly balls that could have been gappers. Mike Surin battled the Watervliet sunset to make two key catches in RF.
We got production up and down the order - Eight of the nine Dodgers scored a run which also means that eight of the nine Dodgers also drove in a run. At least three runs were driven in with two outs.
Fundamentals. Fundamentals - Classic baseball scenario. Bottom of the 6th and the Dodgers holding a six-run lead. Runners on 1st and 2nd with no outs. After a Twins pitching change, John Weber lays down a perfect sac bunt to advance the runners. Surin drives in one run with a single. Ball scores from 3B and Surin scores from 2B on a double by Lane.
Even a blind squirrel finds a nut - The Dodgers have had some struggles this year but we still have good players on our roster. We put a complete game together and enjoyed a nice win over a good Twins team.
The baseball gods were smiling on us - with the clock ticking towards 6:00 o'clock, the Dodgers 9th player texted to say that he was stuck in "accident" traffic. He would not be to Watervliet by game time. We picked up the bat phone and called Steve Lounello. I do believe that Steve was sitting by the phone, in uniform! Five minutes later, Steve was in our dugout and ready to help. He manned 1B for two innings and saved his former team from a forfeit. Thank you Mr. Lounello!
As GM of the Twins, it was my pleasure to agree to the Dodgers request to borrow Steve Lounello to play until their 9th player could get to the game rather than forcing a forfeit. Who wants to win that way ? That would be BS. The Dodgers played a flawless game and deserved the chance.
