Santana’s home run was critical, Pablo López said, because it immediately followed his one bad inning, when he allowed four unearned runs after Edouard Julien’s two-out error to close the Twins’ margin to just 6-4. The big blow came when López left a first-pitch sinker to Zach Neto across the middle. It landed about halfway up the vines in center field, 428 feet away.

“My stuff got flat. I started falling behind guys. But then I got that third out and the guys scored two more, and I was able to go out for two more innings,” said López, who struck out 10, collected his fifth consecutive victory and became the first Twins pitcher since Jake Odorizzi in 2019 to be credited with 15 wins.

Does the sausage help pitchers too? López wouldn’t go that far.

“But it’s great,” he said. “I’m sure seeing the sausage made a lot of guys say, ‘You know what? We know how we can play when everyone is just playing loose.’ ”