Rays 7, Twins 4: It's Raining HRs, Hallelujah

This was Ervin Santana's 10th start of the season. We'll skip his first (shortened by rain) and look at the other nine.

You ignorant peasants may call this "inconsistent." I call it Twins Pitching©. Remember the early 2000s, when Minnesota was plagued by a lack of DH pop? Well, the 2010s are looking like a Pitching Decade Of Depravity.

Three of those homers came today, thanks to community member WestRiverTwinsFan who commented "No home runs for you today Longoria...." This horrific jinx directly caused Santana to give up moonshots, although it wasn't Evan Longoria's that sank the Twins. It was Steven Souza's 2-on, 2-out fourth-inning lead changer. But it's still WestRiver's fault.

Matt Andriese served his function which is "don't make the Twins look like professional baseball players or shame will fall on your name for eternity." If you want to witness the power of Minnesota's Mighty Lumber, check out this comical "accident squeeze."

Amazingly, the Twins managed to get Brian Dozier up as their tying run in the ninth with an all-two-out rally. Then Dozier either A) hit a homer! or B) struck out. Correct guesses will be applauded.

Rookie Watch! Buddy Boshers, Byron Buxton and Max Kepler combined to go 3-9, with 1 SB, one outfield assist, 1 IP, 0 ER. To see who did what you can read the boxscore.

In team news, Glen Perkins is recovering (we're SAVED, get it?) and the Twins are going to skip Phil Hughes next time through the rotation if Kyle Gibson is ready by next Friday. Bollinger has ya covered.

Robot Roll Call: