(Photo credit: Mitch Stringer-USA TODAY Sports)
Cedric Mullins crushed a 1-2 pitch for a walk-off, two-run home run in the bottom of the ninth inning, giving the Baltimore Orioles a 4-2 victory and three-game sweep of the Minnesota Twins on Wednesday afternoon.
Mullins’ fifth homer of the season sailed into the right field seats and his first career walk-off hit gave the Orioles three home runs for the fifth consecutive game. Baltimore has won four straight games.
Gunnar Henderson homered for the third consecutive game with a first-inning blast and Anthony Santander tied the game at 2-all with a homer in the seventh for the Orioles. Henderson’s homer leading off the bottom of the first inning was his sixth long ball of the season.
Baltimore starter Albert Suarez threw 5 2/3 shutout innings, allowing only three hits, in his first major league outing in almost seven years.
Craig Kimbrel (3-0) was the winning pitcher with an inning of scoreless relief. Griffin Jax (1-2) took the loss when his 10th pitch of the ninth inning started over the inside corner but veered to the middle of the plate and found the meat of Mullins’ bat.
Suarez, a 34-year-old right-hander, last pitched in the major leagues in 2017. He was activated earlier in the day from the minor leagues.
Suarez struck out four without a walk and departed with a 1-0 lead.
He was denied his first victory since June 23, 2016, when he was pitching for the San Francisco Giants at Pittsburgh. He lost his final three decisions that season and all three of his decisions in 2017.
Twins starter Pablo Lopez went six innings and was dazzling, allowing one run on two hits with seven strikeouts and no walks before Steven Okert took the ball to start the seventh inning.
Henderson also homered on a 1-2 pitch, lifting Lopez’s fastball to right-center field for the only score in the game until the seventh inning.
Austin Martin’s single with one out in the seventh inning drove in Manuel Margot to the the game. Margot worked a pinch-hit walk to reach base.
The hit came off Jacob Webb, though reliever Danny Coulombe was charged with the run. Kyle Farmer drove in a go-ahead run with a two-out single. It was only the third hit of the season for Farmer.
Santander’s fourth homer of the year came off Okert.
–Field Level Media
