The Twins had runners on the corners and one out in the first inning. They came away with nothing. An inning later, they had the bases loaded with just one out. They scored just one run.
The Twins were unable to take full advantage of their early chances and simply had no chances late, quieted by starter Andre Pallante, who threw seven innings, in a 6-1 loss to the St. Louis Cardinals in the series opener Friday night at Target Field.
Stretching from the third inning to the bottom of the ninth, Cardinals pitchers retired 16 straight Twins batters, most of whom grounded out in a slow night for the offense. Matt Wallner became the first baserunner since the early innings when he drew a walk to lead off the last frame.
“We needed to have many more good at-bats today than we had,” manager Rocco Baldelli said of his Twins (71-57). “It was hard early on because we had bases loaded, we had first and third, we had opportunities to do some things. There’s so many different ways for us to score when we’re in those spots. We just couldn’t find it today.”
The Cardinals (64-64) had no such problems at the plate.
Rookie David Festa was unhittable during his first turn through the lineup, striking out four. But the second time through, he gave up three hits and was eventually chased from the game.
Festa lasted just 3 2/3 innings, allowing a run in the top of the third inning to tie the game and another pair of runs on a Lars Nootbaar double in the fourth that gave St. Louis the lead for good.
“I thought they just did a great job of working at-bats,” Festa said. “I didn’t get a lot of first pitch, second-pitch outs. … I don’t think it had anything to do with the second time around more than just battling and putting together really good at-bats.”
The short start pressed into early action a Twins bullpen that has had a tough go of it lately.
The Twins got 1 1/3 scoreless innings from Caleb Thielbar before Jorge Alcala, pitching in his first game since allowing five runs to Texas last weekend, gave up a leadoff home run to Brendan Donovan in the sixth and then slogged through the rest of the inning, issuing a pair of walks.
Trevor Richards, in his second inning of work, gave up another pair of runs as the Cardinals pulled away in the eighth. One of those runs scored on a bases-loaded walk. In total, the Twins issued nine walks.
The Twins’ lone run in the loss, which dropped them behind the Kansas City Royals to third place in the American League Central Division, came in the second when Austin Martin beat out an infield single with the bases loaded, bringing home catcher Ryan Jeffers for a lead they held just briefly.
“It became kind of a … battle for our bullpen to just keep us where we’re at,” Baldelli said. “We did it for a little while, but ultimately we couldn’t make up the deficit.”
