HOUSTON – Mitch Garver set up for fastball on the four spot — down and away — in the first inning Monday. But Kyle Gibson left it over the middle of the plate for Alex Bregman to bash into the seats in left.
A first-pitch curveball to Yuli Gurriel hung over the middle of the plate in the fourth inning. That one, too, was blasted out to left for a another solo home run.
Those were two big mistakes by Gibson and a reason why the Twins were Labor Day losers to the Astros, falling 4-1 for their eighth loss in 11 games. But there was far more good to Gibson's performance than bad. Houston did score two runs off him in the second, but one was fueled by a Jorge Polanco error on a ball that came up on the shortstop a little bit.
For the most part, Gibson was crisp, getting 12 ground-ball outs and retiring the last 11 Houston hitters he faced after Gurriel's home run — striking out the final two hitters in the seventh inning to finish his outing with authority.
"I thought Gibby had a good day," Twins manager Paul Molitor said. "A couple homers, we didn't field the ball cleanly on a tough play."
Gibson now has pitched at least seven innings 10 times this season, second on the team only to Jose Berrios, who has 12. It was only the second time a Twins starter had pitched six innings, let alone seven, over their past 16 games.
Gibson gave up four runs, two earned, on four hits and one walk while striking out five Monday. He falls to 7-12 on the season, but that record doesn't reflect how he has thrown the ball for most of 2018.
"Garv and I were on the same page all day, mixing up the sequences and knowing when they were going to be aggressive first-pitch," Gibson said. "But like you said, I was hurt by the 2-1 heater by Bregman and executed a poor breaking ball 0-0 to Gurriel. Other than that, it was pretty good."
