Summer sausage behind Twins' seven-game win streak

ANAHEIM -- Baseball's a sport where if you have a good thing going, you don't dare mess with whatever might be providing those positive vibes -- perishable or not.

Last week in Chicago, while the Twins were looking for anything to reverse their early-season struggles, Kyle Farmer put out a packaged summer sausage in the clubhouse.

"It was in my locker, and I didn't want to eat it," he said. "So I put it on the [clubhouse] table."

Instead of eating it, hitting coach David Popkins placed it by the dugout bat rack. It's been there ever since. Ryan Jeffers throws it at teammates following a big hit. He made sure the sausage was transported to California.

And it's…working!

With an 11-5 victory over the Angels at Angel Stadium on Sunday, the Twins have now won seven straight with sweeps of the White Sox and Angels. In each of those seven victories, they've scored at least five runs. And the final two games against Los Angeles have been especially eye-opening.

"It's bringing us a lot of hits and runs, so I'm all for it," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said.

Without the benefit of a homer, the Twins strung together seventeen hits for the second day in a row and compiled 32 runs for the series. All but one starter had at least a hit in another balanced offensive output. Four Minnesota batters -- Jeffers, José Miranda, Willi Castro, and Christian Vázquez -- had three-hit afternoons.

“We had really good at-bats where we were very satisfied with hitting line drives,” Baldelli said. “We had a mentality where we were battling in every at-bat. We didn’t give in. It’s not one or two guys. It’s basically our whole lineup.”

The Twins were without a baserunner in their first turn through the order before Jeffers doubled to left field. He was taken off the basepaths on a double play, but Miranda salvaged the frame with an RBI single.

“We were swinging a bit too much out of the zone,” Miranda said of the lineup being held in check early. “We made adjustments and made sure to get better pitches to hit.”

The mystical powers of the rally sausage took effect in the fourth.

Austin Martin returned from an 0-2 hole to win a seven-pitch battle against Angels starter Reid Detmers on a single that drove in two. Jeffers dropped in a fly ball that landed between outfielders Aaron Hicks and Jo Adell. Martin was able to score on an Adell error. A wild pitch advanced Jeffers to third and a sacrifice fly extended the lead to 5-0.

This good -- "link" charm, which made its first appearance during the four-game sweep of the White Sox, has stayed through the three-game sweep of the Angels. How long the routine -- or the sausage -- will last remains to be determined. The Twins’ recent success has a better chance of staying fresh.

“There’s no doubt when that thing opens up, whoever touches it is in deep trouble,” Baldelli said. “We are carrying something that is very unhealthy to the human body.”

The surge in run production alleviated Pablo López’s fifth-inning struggles. He retired the first 14 Angels batters and showed why he’s a Cy Young Award candidate -- having struck out a season-high eight.

“It was about as locked in and dominant as you could be,” Baldelli said. “He looked awesome.”

But the final out in the fifth was elusive. By the time he ended the inning on a pop-up, López had surrendered four extra-base hits -- including back-to-back homers -- and four runs. Each of the home runs came on fastballs that were around 94 miles per hour, an improvement from the velocity he showed in his previous outing versus Chicago.

“Things started unraveling that inning,” López said. “I feel I was better at some of the things that went wrong in the last couple of starts. Now it’s just a matter of avoiding that crooked number.”

Fortunately for López, the Twins' offense stayed relentless. With the bases loaded in the seventh, Kirilloff went the other way on a Luis García pitch. It landed fair inside the left-field line and hopped over the fence for a ground-rule double as part of another four-run output. Minnesota added two in the eighth.

“We’re making the opposition have to earn it every day,” Baldelli said. “That’s what a good offense looks like.”

But really -- how did the Twins, who batted a franchise-worst .195 through 20 games, turn this around and string together the longest current winning streak in the Majors?

“My guess is it’s the sausage,” Baldelli said deadpanned.