Byron Buxton goes deep again, Twins go deep into bullpen to beat Mariners 3-2

SEATTLE — Most good traveling acts save their biggest hits for the encore. The Luis and Buck Show prefers to get right to work.

Luis Arraez lined the game's first pitch into center field for a single, and Byron Buxton sent a 3-and-2 fastball over the center field wall, giving the Twins a quick start that three hours later turned into a 3-2 victory over the Mariners at T-Mobile Park.

Of course, fast starts are something of a Twins specialty this year. Buxton's homer on Monday, his sixth in the past six days, brought home the Twins' 50th and 51st first-inning runs of the season, the most in the American League. And those two players atop the batting order are a big reason why, of course.

Arraez is a .399 career hitter (61-for-153) in the first inning, and is hitting .421 in the inning this season. And five of Buxton's 18 home runs, including three since Thursday, have come in the first inning.

"[Arraez] is prepared for his first at-bat. He knows what he's going up there trying to do," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. "First inning is a unique spot, because pitchers are sometimes getting settled in and they're not totally comfortable and some maybe aren't doing some things that they do later in the game. If anyone is going to take advantage of it, Luis is going to do that."

And Buxton, named AL Player of the Week earlier in the day, is obviously hitting the ball hard no matter what inning it is.

"I'm just trying to go up there and hit line drives through the ball — through it, not over," Buxton said of his 18th homer of the season. "Just stick with that kind of mentality. They just keep carrying a little bit farther."

Baldelli was impressed to watch Buxton work the count to 3-2, gathering information with each pitch from Mariners starter Chris Flexen.

"He had to make some adjustments in that at-bat. It's not like that swing came easy to him," Baldelli said. "He was trying to figure some things out, just based on what Flexen does. He's got some funny angles. He comes right up over the top. You kind of have to readjust your swing based on what he's doing, because he's a little different."

He was a lot different after that first inning, actually, though the Twins put at least two runners on base in four of Flexen's five innings of work. But Flexen held them to 0-for-4 with runners in scoring position, and Minnesota never scored off him again.

Only Max Kepler's ground-ball single to right in the seventh inning off lefthander Ryan Borucki allowed the Twins to add another run, and it turned out to be a critical one. Twins starter Chris Archer and six relievers held the Mariners to just two runs.

Archer, after back-to-back five-inning starts, pitched only four in the cool (mid-50s) Seattle evening, allowing four hits and two walks. But two of the singles came after Dylan Moore's swing collided with Gary Sanchez's glove in the third inning, interference that allowed Moore to reach first base. Jesse Winker lined a single to right, and Ty France hit a hard grounder that Gio Urshela knocked down but could not handle, a run-scoring infield hit.

In the seventh inning, Jharel Cotton left a first-pitch fastball high in the strike zone for Taylor Trammel, who pummeled it to straightaway center, his second home run of the season.

But Seattle never managed to tie the score, with Emilio Pagan earning his ninth save in 12 opportunities by striking out Winker with the tying run on second base to end the game.