OAKLAND, Calif. — Rocco Baldelli was hesitant to reveal too many of the details before the game, but, he said, Pablo López had a meaningful week in between starts working on a couple of mechanical tweaks.

“I think he had some real pointed ideas about what he was trying to accomplish in between his outings,” Baldelli said before the game.

Mission accomplished.

López, who entered the day with a 9.69 ERA in the month of June, was simply spectacular on Sunday. The starter retired the first 17 batters of the game before allowing a hit, dominating the Oakland Athletics in the Twins’ 3-0 win in the series finale at the Oakland Coliseum.

With the way he was throwing, it looked as if López had a serious chance to write his name into the history books. But with two outs in the sixth inning, after striking out the first two batters of the inning, Lawrence Butler lined a single to right, disrupting López’s bid for perfection.

He allowed just two hits in his eight-inning effort and struck out 14 batters, matching his career high. In the process, he fanned every single Athletics (29-51) batter.

With his pitch count at 102, López did not get the chance to finish off the game, as Bailey Ober did a day before. But eight innings of sheer dominance worked just fine for the Twins (43-35).

López pitched with a lead for much of the day after Byron Buxton hit his fifth home run of the season in the second inning off lefty Hogan Harris.

Harris kept the Twins mostly quiet for much of the game before running into trouble in the seventh. Carlos Santana and Willi Castro started the inning with back-to-back singles before Buxton brought home the team’s second run of the game with a double.

The Twins scored another run on Kyle Farmer’s fielder’s choice, and those three runs were more than enough offensive support for López and Griffin Jax, who completed the shutout with a scoreless ninth for his seventh save.

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