Brewers come back to beat the Twins, 6-4

The Brewers and Twins met for the second of three at Miller Park Tuesday evening, and things did not look good early.

Minnesota jumped out to an early lead. Brewers starter Josh Lindblom gave up two solo home runs in the top of the first inning to Jorge Polanco and Eddie Rosario. Right off the bat, Milwaukee was down 2-0.

Milwaukee did get a run back in the bottom of the first. Lead off man Avisail Garcia launched his first home run as a Brewer into the left field stands to make things 2-1.

Lindblom struggled in this start, but he had what amounted to a big strike out night. He completed four innings, striking out eight.

Unfortunately for Lindblom, he had to face Eddie Rosario one more time in the top of the third. With Nelson Cruz on first base because of a walk, Rosario hit his third home run in two days just beyond the reach of Ben Gamel’s glove. With less than one-third of the game complete, it looked like the Twins were in control of the game.

Two things happened to change all of that.

1. Milwaukee relief pitchers were exceptional.
2. The Pina/Gyorko power display was yet to come.

Milwaukee’s relief corps was sensational. It started in the top of the fifth with Alex Claudio, who kept the Twins’ hitters off-balance with his awkward pitching repertoire. Eric Yardley took the top of the sixth inning and looked to be in a bit of trouble as he allowed Miguel Sano and Byron Buxton to reach base to start the inning. Yardley struck out the next hitter, Max Kepler, and induced a ground ball double play from Jorge Polanco to get out of the inning unscathed.

David Phelps took on the heart of the Twins’ lineup in the top of the seventh. It was three up and three down for Minnesota as Phelps struck out two of the three hitters he faced. Devin Williams took the top of the eighth. He baffled Minnesota hitters with his change up. He got Byron Buxton to swing through two of his change ups right before he painted the black of the outside corner with a 98 mph fastball to get the Twins’ centerfielder looking and end the inning.

Josh Hader pitched the ninth. By the end of his outing, he notched his third save of the season, and he made Twins’ hitters look silly.

Brewers pitching wasn’t all there was, as Manny Pina had a game. In the top of the fifth inning, the Pineapple brought the Brew Crew within two runs with a solo home run.

In the bottom of the sixth, he would tie the game. Following a shift-beating single to right field by Gyorko, Pina, swinging on a 3-0 count, hit a laser beam over the centerfield wall.

Pina would not be able to hog the spotlight as Gyorko came up big as well. Prior to Gyorko’s big moment in the bottom of the eighth, Christian Yelich had a wonderful at-bat. Yelich fell behind 0-2 on a questionable called second strike. Remaining composed, he worked the count to 3-2. With the shift on, Yelich next punched a ground ball where a third baseman would have been five years ago. It resulted in a double. Jedd Gyorko followed that up by hitting a moon shot over the centerfield wall.

The Gyorko home run would be the deciding blow that allows the Brewers the opportunity to win the series with the Twins tomorrow.

First pitch is scheduled at 6:10 CT. Eric Lauer will try to improve on his last outing. He will face off with Kenta Maeda. The game can be seen on Fox Sports Wisconsin and heard on WTMJ 620.