CHICAGO – This tour of the bottom of the American League standings isn't exactly going as the Twins envisioned.
Embarking on a road trip to last-place Chicago and last-place Toronto on the momentum of a four-game winning streak, the Twins hoped to take advantage of their downtrodden brethren to solidify their postseason chances. Instead, after a sloppy, frustrating 5-1 loss to the White Sox on Thursday, the Twins head to Canada having lost three of their five games in Guaranteed Rate Park.
"It's the big leagues," shrugged Jose Berrios, who pitched a Twins loss for the fourth time in six starts despite giving up, by his reckoning, only one hard-hit ball. "That team might not have a good record, but they're big leaguers."
Uh-oh. So are the Blue Jays, and the Twins haven't won in Toronto since 2014.
"It's disappointing to have a chance to win the series" and then not pull it off, said Twins manager Paul Molitor, visibly annoyed by his team's overaggressive approach to White Sox starter Derek Holland, whom they had pummeled for 20 runs in 14 innings already this season. "I just think that hopefully there's a little lesson learned here: You've got to have that intensity from the first inning. We have to come out ready to play from the get-go."
He clearly didn't think they did, particularly galling after he declared before the game that, despite having lost Miguel Sano, Robbie Grossman and Jason Castro to injuries in the past week, "These guys are rallying themselves." But one night after being held to three hits, the Twins eked out only five more off Holland and three Chicago relievers, never more than one per inning, and they went 0-for-9 with runners in scoring position. Even Jorge Polanco, who had homered in each of the first four games here, couldn't deliver this time.
The lone breakthrough came courtesy of Byron Buxton, who led off the sixth inning — an inning Holland hadn't seen in five of his previous seven starts — with a 408-foot blast over the Chicago bullpen, his 10th home run of the season. But no other Twins hitter reached third base, a surprising turnaround for an offense that hit eight home runs in the series' first three games.
The Twins maintained a half-game lead in the race for the second American League Wild Card spot, which they hold only because both Kansas City and Los Angeles lost on Thursday. Seattle won to move within a half-game, and Texas is one-game behind Minnesota. The full standings are here.