FORT MYERS, FLA. — One of the loudest sounds on Saturday happened when Miguel Sano squared up a Kyle Lobstein pitch in the fourth inning and drove it hard off the wall in left field for a double. Fortunately, the wall survived.
Twins manager Paul Molitor couldn't resist cracking a joke when a reporter asked him which sound was louder, the ball hitting Sano's bat or the ball hitting the wall.
''Or the sound of him running,'' Molitor said while chuckling after the Twins beat Pittsburgh 3-0 at Hammond Stadium. ''His approach today was really good off the lefty. He took a lot of tough pitches. When he got in counts in his favor ... I wasn't sure he was going to make it to second, it got out there so quickly.''
Sano was 1-for-2 with a walk Saturday and is batting .294 with a .478 on-base percentage.
You can't handle the Plouffe
Third baseman Trevor Plouffe was 2-for-4 against the Pirates with a two-run single. It comes on the heels of a two-home run game Friday.
Plouffe leads the Twins in hits (15), home runs (four) and RBI (14). He's also batting .375.
He appears to be peaking at the right time, if you believe in such a thing.
''If you don't get hot at the end, I don't think it is particularly a bad sign for certain people,'' Molitor said. ''I think anybody would like to go into the spring feeling good about how they are swinging the bat. I've seen it work both ways.
''A guy hits .090 in the spring and he hits eight home runs in April. And the same way guys can hit .450, then can't buy a hit the first couple of weeks. But you want to see guys putting good swings on the ball, especially when they are in hitters' counts and pitches they can handle. And he's been doing that pretty well the last week.''
