Another Minnesota Twins game - another Minnesota Twins loss. The Twins fell to the Royals Thursday, and fell to 4-9, tied for the second worst start in team history.
Bobby Witt Jr. hit a tiebreaking sacrifice fly in the seventh inning and the Kansas City Royals beat the Minnesota Twins 3-2 on Thursday.
Twins starter Bailey Ober allowed a first-inning run on three consecutive singles, then settled in to permit just two hits over his final five scoreless frames. He finished six innings, allowing a run on five hits and a walk, striking out four.
But once again, the bullpen - supposed to be the team's strength going into the season - couldn't hold the lead with the Royals getting two in the seventh against reliever Cole Sands (1-1).
"Sometimes it's not a lead off, but a hit-by-pitch with an out, and you put a base runner out there," manager Rocco Baldelli described after the game. "And truthfully, they just put the ball in play at that point and you go first to third and all of a sudden we're in a in a defensive spot as as opposed to being on the offensive. And controlling the situation. Once the guy's on base, anything can happen and that's kind of the way it played out. Hit-by-pitch and a chopper and all of a sudden it's first to third."
But the bats continue to be ice cold in the first two weeks of the season. As The Atheletic's Aaron Gleeman points out, the Twins are still hitting under .200 as a team through 13 games. That's only happened twice in 65 years of Twins baseball: 2024 and 2025.
"You know, we didn't give ourselves a cushion so a big part of it is, we put a couple runs on the board," said Baldelli. "Probably should have had a couple more runs on the board and didn't find a way to do that today. So we had to be pretty fine, you know, and we were gonna have to skate around some things when we're trying to hold them to one run."
Next up, the Twins head back to Target Field for their second series of the season in Minneapolis. They'll take on AL Central rivals Detroit for three games.
SERIES PREVIEW
Detroit Tigers (7-5, first in the AL Central) vs. Minnesota Twins (4-9, fourth in the AL Central)
Minneapolis; Friday, 7:10 p.m. Pregame 6:30 on WCCO Radio and the Audacy app (in-market restrictions apply).
LIVE BROADCAST: WCCO's Henry Lake will also have a special Twins Final Pitch Friday night at Inbound BrewCo. They'll have happy hour deals and you’ll also have a chance to win Twins merchandise. Join WCCO and Henry live from 9:30-11:30 in the North Loop!
PITCHING PROBABLES: Tigers: Reese Olson (1-1, 5.06 ERA, 1.50 WHIP, 10 strikeouts); Twins: David Festa (0-0)
Saturday: Jobe (Tigers), Paddack (Twins)
Sunday: Mize (Tigers), Woods Richardson (Twins)
BETMGM SPORTSBOOK LINE: Twins -114, Tigers -106; over/under is 7 1/2 runs
BOTTOM LINE: The Minnesota Twins host the Detroit Tigers to open a three-game series.
Minnesota has gone 1-2 at home and 4-9 overall. The Twins are 3-1 in games when they have more hits than their opponents.
Detroit is 2-4 in road games and 7-5 overall. Tigers hitters have a collective .342 on-base percentage, the seventh-best percentage in MLB play.
The teams meet Friday for the first time this season.
TOP PERFORMERS: Harrison Bader ranks fourth on the Twins with four extra base hits (a double and three home runs). Ty France is 11-for-35 with three doubles, two home runs and five RBI over the last 10 games.
Kerry Carpenter leads the Tigers with four home runs while slugging .568. Riley Greene is 11-for-39 with three home runs and five RBI over the last 10 games.
LAST 10 GAMES: Twins: 4-6, .208 batting average, 3.41 ERA, outscored opponents by one run
Tigers: 7-3, .261 batting average, 2.97 ERA, outscored opponents by 18 runs
INJURIES: Twins: Brock Stewart: 15-Day IL (hamstring), Brooks Lee: 10-Day IL (back), Royce Lewis: 10-Day IL (hamstring), Michael Tonkin: 15-Day IL (shoulder)
Tigers: Wenceel Perez: 60-Day IL (spine), Jake Rogers: 10-Day IL (oblique), Manuel Margot: 10-Day IL (knee), Gleyber Torres: 10-Day IL (oblique), Ty Madden: 60-Day IL (shoulder), Alex Cobb: 15-Day IL (hip), Matt Vierling: 10-Day IL (shoulder), Parker Meadows: 60-Day IL (nerve), Jose Urquidy: 60-Day IL (elbow), Sawyer Gipson-Long: 60-Day IL (hip), Alex Lange: 60-Day IL (lat)