ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — For a place where the Twins spend seven weeks every spring, Florida sure has turned against them.
Luke Raley tripled home a run and Harold Ramirez brought him home with a 416-foot home run off Bailey Ober, and the Twins were swept for the first time this season, falling 4-2 to the Rays in Tropicana Field.
The loss was the Twins’ fifth straight — and fifth straight in Florida, after going 1-2 at Miami in April — and finished off a dismally quiet showdown with a fellow division leader. The Twins were outscored 13-3 in the series, and collected only 13 hits in 27 innings, to fall below .500 at 31-32 for the first time this season.
The Twins amassed six of those hits in Thursday’s finale, but two in the same inning only once, in a scoreless first inning. Their two runs both came on solo home runs, one by Carlos Correa — his seventh of the year but first since May 13 — and the other by Michael A. Taylor, giving him eight on the year.
Even worse for Minnesota: Jorge Polanco felt tightness in his left hamstring as he ran to first base in the first inning, the same injury that put him on the injured list last month. Polanco was removed from the game, and his availability for the weekend has not been determined.
Yonny Chirinos, making only his second start of the season for Tampa Bay, gave up five hits, including Correa’s blast into the left-field seats, over 5⅔ innings. The Twins managed only one hit against a trio of Rays relievers after Chirinos was lifted, Taylor’s leadoff home run in the eighth off lefthander Colin Poche.
Ober, now 3-3, started strong, striking out six straight batters in the second and third innings. But a two-out walk to Randy Arozarena in the fourth inning was costly, since Raley followed with a line drive down the right field line, his second career triple, both of them coming in this series. Ober’s next pitch, a slider over the middle, was driven high off the center-field wall by Ramirez, his ninth home run.
A defensive mistake cost the Twins one more run in the sixth, when Wander Franco stole third base against Griffin Jax. The right-hander’s throw got past third baseman Royce Lewis, and Franco scored on the error.
The Twins now head to Toronto to face the Blue Jays, who won two games out of three at Target Field in May.