Pablo López strong, Twins continue surge with 6-1 victory over Astros

HOUSTON – The Twins couldn’t quite force a Game 5 in their American League Division Series against Houston last October, so we’ll never know if Pablo López would have dominated the Astros once again in the series-deciding game.

But “this is how I hoped it would have went,” López said after pitching seven strong innings Friday.

The righthander gave up just six hits and allowed only one Astros player — Alex Bregman, who hit López’s lone mistake pitch off the left field foul pole — to reach third base as Minnesota won for the eighth time in 10 games, 6-1 inside Minute Maid Park.

López, who provided seven shutout innings here in the Twins’ lone ALDS victory, was a different pitcher than the one who had allowed 16 runs over his last 16 innings. Heck, he even looked different, having cropped his beard down to a goatee.

“He looked like one of those assassins from [TV series] ‘Breaking Bad,’ ” catcher Ryan Jeffers said with admiration.

Pitched like an assassin, too. López’s fastball velocity reached 96 mph, and his sweeper helped him pile up 17 swing-and-misses. He allowed a couple of infield hits but virtually no hard contact, struck out six, walked only one and, other than the first-pitch sweeper that Bregman hit only 96.2 mph and lofted a mere 348 feet to the Crawford Boxes, had little trouble controlling the Astros lineup. He threw just 93 pitches to get through seven innings, his longest start since Opening Day.

“In the bullpen warming up, I told him, ‘That’s the best I’ve seen you since last year.’ He looked really good,” Jeffers said. “He really is an ace. He knows that.”

Astros starter Ronel Blanco, on the other hand, absorbed his first loss of the season and easily his worst start of 2024. Blanco, who no-hit the Blue Jays in April, gave up only three hits, but four runs, in part because he walked three Twins, too.

The Twins’ biggest weapon against the righthander, who served a 10-game suspension earlier this month when a foreign substance was found on his glove? Patience.

In the third inning, Willi Castro smacked a triple to the center field wall on the sixth pitch of his at-bat, and Jose Miranda battled through an 11-pitch confrontation before drawing a walk. Blanco struck out Trevor Larnach, but Carlos Correa followed with an RBI double to right field, and Alex Kirilloff hit a sacrifice fly, putting the Twins ahead thanks to a 32-pitch inning.

Two innings later, Castro led off with a nine-pitch walk, and Miranda flew out on Blanco’s fourth pitch. Then came Larnach, who worked the count to 3-2, fouled off a couple and crushed the ninth pitch of the at-bat 401 feet over the center field wall, a two-run shot.

“Everyone in our lineup went out there with a good plan. He didn’t have many quick stretches,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “He had to work, and we got him out of there early.”

BOXSCORE: Twins 6, Houston 1

Carlos Santana also homered, off reliever Alex Speas, and Jeffers set up another run by doubling Max Kepler, who was hit by a pitch, to third. Kepler scored on Manuel Margot’s grounder to shortstop.

It was all more than enough runs for López.

“A lot of people said he looked a lot meaner today, getting ready,” Baldelli said.

Could the secret to pitching really be in López’s razor?

Maybe so, López mused of his new look. He tried it last year, too, with similar results.

“Sometimes we think it has to be something in the mechanics, something about pitching,” López said. “What if it’s something different? I had to take a chance.”