The Minnesota Twins found the offense, but still couldn’t beat the Toronto Blue Jays on Wednesday night at Rogers Center. Toronto emerged from the slugfest with a 9-7 victory.
The Blue Jays were up to their old tricks, crunching three home runs and forcing the Twins to try and play catch up most of the night.
But the Twins were able to make a game out of it, as the offense finally got going.
#mntwins have scored 7 runs in 5 innings tonight.
In their previous 5 games, they scored 7 runs TOTAL (7 runs in 45.2 innings)
— Keith Leventhal (@KeithLeventhal) August 6, 2015
It didn’t take the Twins long to get on the board. Miguel Sano drove in Aaron Hicks in the top of the first inning to put the Twins on top 1-0. Trevor Plouffe followed with a two-run double giving rookie Tyler Duffey (0-1) some run support.
But Duffey failed to hold the lead in his Major League debut. He gave up two runs in the first on a two-run homer to Josh Donaldson. Then in the second, Jose Bautista launched grand slam well over the center field fence.
Duffey gave up six runs, all on homers, in the two innings he pitched.
Edwin Encarnacion added a three-run blast in the bottom of the fourth inning off Twins reliever J.R. Graham.
Drew Hutchison (10-2) labored through five innings to pick up the victory for the Jays. He gave up seven runs on seven hits in five innings.
Former Twin LaTroy Hawkins pitched a scoreless ninth for the save – his fourth of the season and first of his career against the Twins.
Sano led the Twins at the plate. He was 2-for-4 with a home run and three RBIs. Hicks, who was moved to the leadoff spot for just the second time this season, was 2-for-4 with a pair of runs scored. Joe Mauer also drove in a pair of runs with a two-out single.
The Twins will try to avoid a four-game sweep on Thursday evening with Kyle Gibson on the mound against Toronto lefty Mark Buehrle.
