Taj Bradley outduels Tarik Skubal as Twins beat Tigers
· Yahoo Sports
An announced crowd of 12,341 fans at Target Field was treated to a dominant start by a pitcher who has been among the best in the league in the early going of this season on Tuesday night.
Oh, and reigning two-time American League Cy Young Award winner Tarik Skubal pitched, too.
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Twins starter Taj Bradley outdueled Skubal, one of, if not the, best pitchers in the game, on Tuesday night in a 4-1 win over the Detroit Tigers, continuing his strong start to his season. Bradley pitched into the seventh inning, allowing just one run — which scored after he departed — and putting up zeros through the early innings to match Skubal.
His biggest challenge came in the second inning when he allowed a pair of hits and hit a batter with a pitch, but he successfully extracted himself from that situation by getting Colt Keith to ground out to second.
Bradley struck out 10 batters in his 6 1/3-inning start, six of which came on his splitter, which was particularly effective on Tuesday night. It was exactly the type of performance the Twins needed with Skubal on the other side.
The Twins finally broke through against the southpaw in the fifth inning, with Byron Buxton and Austin Martin working a pair of walks to ignite a rally. Luke Keaschall, whose two-run home run a night earlier broke open a tied game, was once again responsible for breaking open the tie, sending a single up the middle.
Catcher Ryan Jeffers followed by sending a double into right field to bring home a pair of runners and Josh Bell drove in the Twins’ fourth run of the game with an RBI single that knocked Skubal out of the game.
Jeffers had a strong day behind the plate, too, challenging two pitches for inning-ending strikeouts, including one in the seventh inning to help strand a pair of Tigers runners on base.