Twins squander golden chances, fall to White Sox 6-4

CHICAGO — Ryan Jeffers led off the seventh inning of a tie game Wednesday with a line-drive single, and Max Kepler followed by beating out an infield hit. Jorge Polanco dribbled a pitch that righthander Gregory Santos fielded quickly before slipping on the grass, allowing Polanco to reach first.

And, with Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton coming up, the White Sox had the Twins right where they wanted them.

With its infielders drawn in, Chicago forced runners out at the plate when Correa and Buxton each failed to get the ball out of the infield. And when Santos struck out Trevor Larnach, one of the Twins' most persistent and inexplicable weaknesses — their lack of clutch hits with the bases loaded — had doomed them again, this time to a 6-4 loss at Guaranteed Rate Field.

"Didn't get the job done, so it's definitely a letdown," a clearly annoyed Buxton said. "But those are the chances we want, especially [with Correa and himself] coming up in that situation. And we just didn't the job done, simple as that."

Even more irritating was the way the White Sox, who won for only the 10th time all year, took advantage of their chances — including once with the bases loaded. And immediately after the Twins missed their big chance, Chicago pounced, with four consecutive hitters reaching base against Griffin Jax and Eloy Jiménez lining a run-scoring single to provide the go-ahead run.

"That's kind of been the story of my season — soft singles that end up scoring," Jax said after dropping to 1-3 on the year. "People keep saying things will even out. I'm just waiting for that to happen."

So are the Twins, especially with the bases loaded. After all, Correa and Buxton both doubled home runs in the Twins' third-inning rally, and Nick Gordon, who hadn't driven in a run until Sunday, homered for a second straight night to give Minnesota a brief lead in the fourth. All of which probably made their 0-for-3 with the bases loaded in the seventh hurt even more.

The Twins are now 3-for-24 with the bases loaded this season, a .125 average that ranks dead last in the majors. With the other 29 teams combining to hit .295 in those situations, and averaging roughly one run driven in per at-bat, the Twins' 11 total runs driven in stand out even more.

"We can say [that's] fluky, or we can take some ownership of it. We just have to do a better job getting pitches that we can do something with, and finding the barrel more often," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. "We've got everything going for us, and we know what happened after that. It wasn't what we were looking for, but I'm not going to sit here and say it was fluky."

Perhaps for good reason, since it's a problem that has frequently cost them during Baldelli's tenure as manager. Minnesota batted an AL-worst .203 in those situations in 2021, and even during their 101-win 2019 season, they hit just .217 with bases loaded, ranking 13th in the American League.

Meanwhile, Louie Varland's return to the Twins' rotation, this time probably for more than one start given the injuries to Kenta Maeda and Tyler Mahle, was largely a success — except for a 2-2 fastball that Luis Robert hammered to center field in the first inning. The 420-foot blast scored three runs, but the rookie righthander responded by retiring eight of the next nine hitters he faced.

Varland gave up another run in the fourth, however, when the White Sox — yep — loaded the bases with two outs. Tiim Anderson singled to right field, scoring Gavin Sheets, but Max Kepler threw out catcher Yasmani Grandal at the plate to prevent any further damage.

The Twins were able to come back impressively against Chicago righthander Dylan Cease. Willi Castro ignited the rally with a leadoff single in the third, and when Pólanco provided a two-out single, Correa knocked them both in with a double down the left field line. Buxton followed with a double that traveled 407 feet and nearly cleared the center field wall.

But it's that bases-loaded fizzle that still stung afterward.

"We go ground ball, ground ball. There are a lot of ground balls in that situation where you do score a run," Baldelli groused. "But we didn't get it done. Some [of our problems] were self-inflicted. There's no one to blame."