Zebby Matthews didn’t show any outward emotion when he struck out Bobby Witt Jr. for his first career strikeout. He watched catcher Christian Vázquez roll the ball to the dugout for a memento, then he completed his circular walk behind the mound.
Four months ago, Matthews made his season debut at Class A-Advanced Cedar Rapids in front of an announced crowd of 683. Now here he was striking out the hottest hitter in the league.
The 24-year-old Matthews introduced himself to the big leagues with a solid outing, giving up five hits and two runs in five innings. The Twins offense seemed determined to make sure it was a celebratory evening, knocking Kansas City Royals starter Seth Lugo into his worst outing of the season and securing a series win during a 13-3 victory at Target Field.
The Twins remain 3½ games behind the first-place Cleveland Guardians, but they have a 2½-game lead on the Royals in the wild-card standings.
Matthews, a consensus top 100 prospect, saw Michael Massey drive the second pitch of his major league career to the wall in left field where Matt Wallner made a leaping catch. He struck out Witt and induced a flyout to complete his first inning, drawing applause from the Target Field crowd of 25,885 as he walked off the mound for the first time.
He is known for his strike-throwing ability — he walked seven batters in 97 minor league innings — but his quick rise to the big leagues was a result of his swing-and-miss pitches. He had a stretch, in his second time through the Royals lineup, where he struck out four of five batters.
Matthews surrendered a solo homer to MJ Melendez in the second inning and an RBI double to Massey in the fifth inning on a ball that was out of reach for diving right fielder Max Kepler, but he didn’t look out of place in his debut.
The Twins offense gifted Matthews a three-run lead in the first inning. After Willi Castro hit a leadoff double to the right-field wall against Lugo, who entered with the fourth-lowest ERA (2.72) in the majors, Royce Lewis hit an RBI single up the middle to end a nine-pitch at-bat.