Tyler Duffey pitches a gem to stop the Twins slide

The Angels pulled even with the Twins in the wild card race with a 4-3 win in 12 innings on Saturday afternoon and went up by a game with their second win of the day.

Despite getting a short night of sleep Wednesday after the series finale in Seattle and playing a four-hour marathon on Thursday, Angels manager Mike Scioscia wasn’t thrilled about the prospect of a night off.

“He wanted the ball”, manager Mike Scioscia said.

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – Off a disappointing, extra-inning loss a day earlier, the playoff hopeful Minnesota Twins were hoping to bounce back against another team fighting for a postseason berth.

Los Angeles took the first game of the doubleheader 4-3 when Kole Calhoun’s liner eluded shortstop Eduardo Escobar’s glove to allow Dan Robertson to score from third in the 12th inning.

The Astros snapped their five-game losing streak Saturday night with a 10-6 comeback victory over the A’s that turned on a three-run, opposite-field Evan Gattis home run in the seventh inning off former Houston pitcher Fernando Rodriguez.

Shoemaker, who rebounded from a brief demotion to triple-A to surrender only one run and six hits in 14-1/3 innings during wins over Detroit (Aug. 27) and Oakland (Sept. 1), gave up a solo homer to Torii Hunter, the former Angels outfielder, in the second. We just have to try to find a way to keep plugging away. He is likely to start the final game of the series on Sunday. “Taking three out of four is huge”.

“We all know; we know that we control our own fate from here on out given with the teams we play from here until the end of the season”, said right-hander Garrett Richards, the victor of Saturday’s second game.

Minnesota added a pair of runs in the fifth inning thanks to two bases-loaded walks – one by Nunez, the other by Hicks. Shoemaker allowed just one run over his previous two starts. “His curveball has so much bite that most of the time they hit the top of the ball – if they hit it”.

Because in every case, until now, time has been on the Twins’ side. However, back-to-back bad starts against the Chicago White Sox and Kansas City Royals got Shoemaker demoted to the minors for 10 days to work out the kinks again.

The Angels were scoreless until the ninth when rookie catcher Jett Bandy made a pinch-hitting appearance with two outs. He hasn’t given up more than three runs in a start since his first Major League start against the Toronto Blue Jays.

“I feel awful for putting (Gott) in that situation”, Heaney said. “It just was no fun out there”. It’s showing to be pretty valuable for him right now.

“I still feel good”, Molitor said.