9/21-9/22 - Oakland Coliseum
GAME 1 - A's 5, Twins 2
Vida Blue (3-6, 5.08) was tasked with beating the ultimate clutch pitcher of his time Jack Morris (3-3, 2.28). Blue, who has been nothing sort of dreadful for the A's this season needed to revert back to his 1971 AL Cy Young form or he would have no chance at all. For 8 glorious innings Blue was authoring himself a 3 hit shutout. In the 9th he began to tire and as a result the Twinkies put a big scare into the A's by posting 2 runs. Blue began running out of gas, but a vote of confidence was given to him when he looked into the home bullpen and saw nobody up. It was his game to win or lose. After Chuck Knoblauch sliced a 2 run / 2 out double to right center Pedro Munoz came to the plate and Blue found a way to blow three bullets right by him for the K and the win. Oakland's offense spotted Blue two runs in the bottom of the 1st when Joe Rudi singled home Campy Campaneris and Reggie
hit a sac fly to score Billy North. Oakland would score 3 more off of the normally stingy Morris in the 5th when North led off with a bunt single and stole second. With 2 outs Sal Bando narrowly missed a 2 run homer and had to settle for a RBI double. Gene Tenance followed that up with and RBI single as did Dick Greeen 2 batters later to make it 5-0.
GAME 2 - Twins 7, A's 6
If Oakland misses the post season by 1 game, they will look back on this game as the one that got away. Down 7-3 after 7 innings the A's rallied back to score solo runs in the final 3 frames. With nobody out, the bases loaded and 1 run already in Rick Aguliera was summoned from the pen and tasked with the impossible duty of getting 3 outs and not allowing the tying or winning runs to score. Oakland fans had to think it was a sure thing to at least tie it. The lesson to be learned, in baseball there are no sure things. The first hurdle for Aggie to face was Gene Tenace, who struck out on 4 pitches for out number 1. With the infield drawn in Derron Johnson hit a 1 hop bullet to Pags at third who turned fast and gunned down Joe Rudi for the 2nd out at the plate. Aggie was now 2/3 of the way done when Dick Green stepped up to the plate. Aggie and Green battled in a classic 11 pitch AB that culminated in the Twin reliever getting green to ground weakly to Pags at third to end the game and quite possibly Oakland's chances of making the post season.
9/23-9/24 - HHH Metrodome
GAME 3 - A's 4, Twins 1
After Catfish Hunter's poor performance the day before (8.1 IP / 7
ER), Ken Holtzman (7-2, 2.57) was once again asked to be the "stopper". Holtzman not only rose to the occasion to put his team in a position to win, but he also battled through adversity all day. Inning by inning he was in and out of trouble. When he needed to get a DP a strike out or even a pop up he seemed to find a way to will it to happen. With the score tied a 1 the A's finally got to Twin starter Scott Erickson (0-6, 5.89) by scoring 3 runs in the top of the 8th. With 1 out and runners on 1st and 2nd Reggie singled home Campy Campaneris. Sal Bando hit one to the base of the wall and narrowly missed a homer, which accounted for out #2. With the score 2-1 the A's desperately needed a clutch hit to get some insurance runs. Gene Tenace, who came up small yesterday by striking out with the bases loaded, came through today with a 2 run double, which gave Holtzman just enough runs to win 4-1.
GAME 4 - A's 5, Twins 0
With their season on the ropes the A's decided to go unconventional. With John "Blue Moon" Odom scheduled to start A's manager Marc Weiss decided to go with a hunch instead. The hunch: Give the ball to veteran lefty swingman Darold Knowles. Conventional wisdom would have sided with Odom getting the start vs the powerful righty lineup of the Twins in a game played in the homer dome. Conventional wisdom did not win out, Knowles (1-1, 0.96) did. Oakland posted a two spot in the 1st inning to give Knowles some breathing room and some margin for error. The tablesetters (Campaneris & North) both singled to start the frame, then executed to perfection a game changing double steal. That setup Joe Rudi with 2 ducks on the pond and Oakland's All-Star left fielder delivered a line shot single to left for two "Rib-eyes". The A's would get 2 additional runs off of Minnesota starter Tom "East of" Edens in the top of the 6th when Sal Bando singled home Joe
Rudi, then scored himself on a two out single by Ted Kubiak. Knowles by this point was operating under the radar screen by getting key outs and just staying out of trouble. The bottom of the 6th inning was Minnesota's big chance to score. With runners on 1st and 2nd and two out Knowles was able to get Knoblauch to ground out back to the originator to end the threat. Horacio Pina and Rollie Fingers would come on in relief for the final 2 1/3 innings to lock down the victory for the unheralded Knowles, who just might see some time on the hill vs the Angels in the final series of the season, which will be a battle for 1st place in the division.
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