Randy Arozarena crushed a home run in the ninth inning to lift the Tampa Bay Rays to a 5-4 win over the Minnesota Twins on Wednesday afternoon in Minneapolis.
Home run No. 22 for the All-Star outfielder was a 448-foot moonshot that came with two outs off Griffin Jax.
Robert Stephenson recorded a one-out save, striking out Christian Vazquez to strand a runner on second. The save was his first of the season.
Kevin Kelly (5-2) threw two scoreless innings with one strikeout for the win. Jax (6-10) was tagged with the loss.
The Rays (90-57) took two of three in the series and rebounded after Minnesota (76-70) rallied to a 3-2 win on Tuesday night.
The Rays prevailed after allowing a four-run lead to disappear.
In the second inning, the Rays jumped on top with three runs off Twins left-hander Dallas Keuchel. Curtis Mead got things started with a triple, and he scored on Osleivis Basabe’s fielder’s choice ground ball, which deflected off Keuchel. Yandy Diaz provided the big hit in the inning, a two-run double, for a 3-0 lead.
Tampa Bay went up 4-0 in the third inning on Mead’s RBI double.
Minnesota answered in the third inning with back-to-back home runs from Matt Wallner and Kyle Farmer off Rays starter Taj Bradley.
The Rays had a chance to add on in the fifth inning, but a baserunning lapse by Mead defused the inning. Harold Ramirez singled and Paredes walked, prompting a pitching change. Dylan Floro replaced Keuchel and got Mead to slap a comeback grounder that deflected off Floro. The Twins reliever recovered the ball and forced Ramirez out at third.
Twins third baseman Royce Lewis threw across the diamond to double up Mead, who slowed up before touching first base. Initially Mead was called safe, but the Twins challenged and the double play was called.
Momentum swung in favor of the Twins, who tied it at 4 in the fifth inning on Max Kepler’s two-out, two-run triple. Bradley walked Edouard Julien and Jorge Polanco, and with two outs, Jake Diekman had replaced Bradley. Even with the lefty-on-lefty matchup, Kepler ripped his triple to right.
–Field Level Media