Gee to start as Royals seek continued dominance of Twins
MINNEAPOLIS -- The Kansas City Royals will try to continue their dominance of the Minnesota Twins when the teams play the second of a three-game series on Saturday night at Target Field.
Kansas City is 6-1 against Minnesota this season, including a 7-3 victory in the series opener here on Friday.
The main reason for Kansas City's success has been the play of catcher Salvador Perez, who has been a Twins killer over the years and was again on Friday.
Perez had just one hit Friday, but it was an important one, muscling through a Kyle Gibson curveball that snapped his bat and blooping it into shallow left, scoring two runs and giving Kansas City a lead it wouldn't relinquish.
For the season, Perez is hitting .519 against the Twins and has a .322 career mark against them.
"Those are the kind of breaks that have been going against us a little bit," said Royals manager Ned Yost. "To finally take the lead back, that was a big hit. But that's what happens when you put the ball in play. You got guys in scoring position and you find ways to put the ball in play. It doesn't have to be pretty, it just has to be effective, and that certainly was effective."
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Minnesota got home runs from Miguel Sano and Brian Dozier on Friday. Both players have been red hot of late, but other than those two, the Twins have struggled to score consistently.
Sano has five home runs in his last seven games and reached the 20 home-run plateau for the first time in his career.
Dozier's 17 homers since June 19 are more than any other player in baseball.
"It's unfortunate that (Dozier and Sano) has been the majority of our output it seems as of late," said Twins manager Paul Molitor. "Runners in scoring position, opportunities, some of those things are still areas that need improvement.
"We like the home runs, they play for sure, but we need to find some other ways to score."
Kansas City will turn to Dillon Gee in game two of the series, three days after he pitched two innings and earned the victory in the Royals' 14-inning win over the Chicago White Sox. Gee had his worst outing of the season in a start against the Twins on May 25, allowing six runs (five earned) on 10 hits and a walk in five innings.
Tyler Duffey will try for his third consecutive victory for Minnesota. He allowed just one run on four hits and a walk with eight strikeouts in six innings against Houston on Monday.
