{"id":273603,"date":"2023-07-06T09:38:06","date_gmt":"2023-07-06T14:38:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=273603"},"modified":"2023-07-07T10:15:02","modified_gmt":"2023-07-07T15:15:02","slug":"lopez-shows-off-ridiculous-control-in-career-shutout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=273603","title":{"rendered":"L\u00f3pez Shows Off ‘Ridiculous’ Control In Career Shutout"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

MINNEAPOLIS — It\u2019s been a long time since Twins fans have had a chance to enjoy a season of starting pitching like this — and that\u2019s why the 19,692 fans at Target Field on Wednesday sprang to their feet and roared in appreciation of Pablo L\u00f3pez when he emerged from the dugout alone ahead of the ninth inning, just as they did for Joe Ryan two weeks ago<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And the Twins\u2019 Opening Day starter just wanted to give that energy back to his team and the fans, having the most fun of his life as he mowed down hitter after hitter on one of those rare nights where a pitcher feels good about all of his pitches, in total command of the game plan. That effort ended with L\u00f3pez saluting the crowd in triumph after he set a new career-high with 12 strikeouts in his first career shutout, a 5-0 Twins victory over Kansas City<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEvery little milestone that all of us as players get to achieve, we need to soak it in,\u201d L\u00f3pez said. \u201cBecause as players, as people, we spend so much time dwelling on failure that I think we don\u2019t cherish the good times as much. \u2026 But when good moments like this come, I think it\u2019s very, very important to enjoy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After the Twins went 1,909 days without experiencing the exhilaration of a complete-game shutout, they\u2019ve now seen two in 14 days, between Wednesday and Ryan\u2019s effort against the Red Sox on June 22. It\u2019s the first time since \u201811 that they\u2019ve had multiple pitchers throw shutouts in the same season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Twins\u2019 acquisition of L\u00f3pez in an offseason trade<\/a> that sent reigning batting champion Luis Arraez to the Marlins completed a pitching staff that has been the Majors\u2019 best in most major categories, from ERA to strikeout rate to OPS against to innings per start to quality starts. And this is the upside of that staff\u2019s Opening Day starter when he\u2019s at his best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe carried it from the first pitch to the last,\u201d manager Rocco Baldelli said. \u201cAn incredible night for everybody involved here, just ridiculous. I mean, he was just ridiculous, the way every pitch was, I think, almost precisely what he was looking for.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

L\u00f3pez threw first-pitch strikes to 25 of 30 batters, retired 15 in a row from the third to eighth innings and struck out six in a row in the fifth and sixth innings. He needed only 13 pitches to complete the final two frames to finish the game at exactly 100, aided by an inning-ending, run-saving diving catch from Max Kepler in the eighth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just a lot of fun, because you know you don\u2019t have to give in, in any situations,\u201d L\u00f3pez said. \u201cYou have the weapons, you have the feel to throw them in any count, to challenge the batters. That was a good feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Though L\u00f3pez entered the game with a 4.24 ERA, that has been misleading in some ways and not indicative of the dazzling underlying metrics that suggested an expected ERA of 3.10, spurred by the soaring strikeout total that pushed L\u00f3pez past Shohei Ohtani to second in the American League.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

L\u00f3pez\u2019s 138 strikeouts are tied for fourth-most in a first half in Twins history behind two Bert Blyleven seasons and a Johan Santana season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou\u2019ve got to celebrate the successes in this game,\u201d said catcher Ryan Jeffers, who caught both shutouts. \u201cThis game is so hard. We put in so much work, so much effort into the game prep and they put in so much work into getting themselves ready for the start. To see it all kind of come together and come to fruition is awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it\u2019s fitting that L\u00f3pez got to celebrate by wearing the Twins\u2019 \u201cLand of 10,000 Rakes\u201d fishing vest given to hitters after home runs — because L\u00f3pez is the one who brought that to the clubhouse, and he joked that, since pitchers won\u2019t get a chance to homer, they should be able to don it if they throw a shutout.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That was fun for him. The Twins are having fun again. And L\u00f3pez just wanted to embody that for everyone to see.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHe\u2019s been great for us all year, but to see a guy do it on one night, that\u2019s kind of bright, it\u2019s really noticeable, it\u2019s neon lights,\u201d Baldelli said. \u201cIt\u2019s \u2018Here I am,\u2019 and that was a \u2018Here I am\u2019 performance.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MINNEAPOLIS — It\u2019s been a long time since Twins fans have had a chance to enjoy a season of starting pitching like this — and that\u2019s why the 19,692 fans at Target Field on Wednesday sprang to their feet and roared in appreciation of Pablo L\u00f3pez when he emerged from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":273604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-273603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=273603"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273603\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":273605,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/273603\/revisions\/273605"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/273604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=273603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=273603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=273603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}