Bailey Ober, recovering from illness, bounces back in Twins' win over Astros

Minnesota Twins starter Bailey Ober recovered from a rough season debut — both physically and metaphorically — in Minnesota's first home win of the season, a 6-1 victory over the Houston Astros Saturday at Target Field in Minneapolis.

Ober got rocked in his first start of the season on Sunday when he gave up eight runs off eight hits, including a pair of homers, in just 2 2/3 innings in a loss to the St. Louis Cardinals. But Ober wasn't at his best for a reason; he spent the days leading up to the start battling illness and wasn't able to do much else besides throwing up and sleeping two days prior.

The 29-year-old right-hander said he lost eight pounds while battling the illness last week.

"Been feeling good throughout the week, just being able to get healthy, and yeah, felt really good," said Ober, who allowed just one run off three hits while striking out five across four innings in Saturday's win over the Astros. "Could tell towards the end, just maybe because my pitch count was up that I was starting to get a little fatigued. But yeah, I'm just getting my strength back throughout the weight room and just getting my body weight back up, so I'm feeling a little bit better."

After giving up a leadoff homer to Jose Altuve, Ober looked more like himself on Saturday. He only allowed two hits the rest of his outing, navigated around trouble in the second inning, tossed a 1-2-3 third inning and kept the Astros off the scoreboard again in the fourth. Twins manager Rocco Baldelli pulled Ober after the fourth because his pitch count had quickly climbed to 84, and Ober knew his outing was coming to an end after he threw 27 pitches in the fourth inning.

"We know (Ober is) a resilient guy and a resilient pitcher, and he always finds ways to work through situations. He finds a way," Baldelli said. "... He's always looking for an angle to take advantage of, and he found a way to do it. Obviously, they start the game on top, but it really didn't affect him at all, he just continued to work. And again, got us through what he could get us through (Saturday) and did a pretty nice job, and the bullpen did a great job, too."

The Twins took the lead in the bottom of the fourth when Jose Miranda hit a three-run homer as part of a six-run frame. Twins relievers picked up where Ober left off and pitched a shutout the rest of the way. He battled and gave Minnesota a strong four innings of work on a day the team had no problem turning to a fresh bullpen after an off day on Friday.

And it's worth noting Ober had a nearly identical start to the 2024 season. He had a similarly lousy first start last year against the Kansas City Royals, a performance he followed up with a solid five-inning outing against the Los Angeles Dodgers in which he allowed just one run off three hits. His earned-run average to start the year last season was 54.00, which he lowered to 12.79 after his second start; Ober lowered his ERA from 27.00 to 12.15 following Saturday's start.

By the middle of last season, Ober put together an 11-game quality start streak. Perhaps that's next on the horizon.

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