 surrendered just one run for his third consecutive start, striking out six and allowing five hits in seven innings. In 15 starts since his recall from the minors last August, the left-hander is 8-2 with a 2.74 ERA.Gibson (1-1) gave up four runs on five hits in 6 1/3 innings, striking out seven.Daniel Robertson homered in the eighth for Tampa Bay, his second.Brian Dozier led off the game with a double and scored on Miguel Sano's sacrifice fly. The hit stretched Dozier's season-opening hitting streak to 15 games, the longest current streak in the majors. He has hit in 22 straight games going back to last season, batting .376 in that stretch.Joe Mauer went 0 for 4 for the Twins, ending his streak of 27 games reaching base safely against Tampa Bay.TRAINER'S ROOMTwins: OF Byron Buxton, who was placed on the 10-day disabled list Wednesday with migraines, took batting practice and reported that the problem persists, though some of the blurred vision and dizziness have subsided.Rays: 3B Matt Duffy (strained right hamstring) took ground balls, and the Rays are hopeful he will come off the 10-day disabled list during their upcoming nine-game trip.UP NEXTTwins: RHP Phil Hughes will pitch Sunday's series finale, becoming Minnesota's fifth pitcher to start a game this season.Rays: RHP Yonny Chirinos, who has started three ''bullpen-day'' games, will pitch Sunday and is now ''penciled in to pitch every fifth day,'' manager Kevin Cash said.---More baseball: https://apnews.com/tag/MLBbaseball)
Gibson, Twins look to even series with Rays 2h ago• 2 min read ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Wins have been hard enough for the Tampa Bay Rays to come by this season that they'll take them however they can get, embracing the momentum that comes with them.Tampa Bay (6-13) has now won three of four games -- after opening the year 3-12 -- and hope to continue that success with a hot pitcher as Blake Snell takes the mound on Saturday afternoon."We feel sexy about it," outfielder Carlos Gomez said after veteran bats played a big role in Friday's 10-inning win. "It's not how old you are, it's how you feel. And every day I feel hot." The Rays looked to have another late-inning bullpen collapse when reliever Sergio Romo, up 6-2 in the eighth, gave up a grand slam to tie the game. Max Kepler put the Twins ahead with a solo home run, but the Rays rallied to tie the game with two outs in the ninth, then won on a fielding error in the 10th when Zach Duke didn't touch first as he fielded a flip for a potential inning-ending out."Tough play to end on a PFP play," Twins manager Paul Molitor said of the pitchers-fielding-practice mishap.Snell has shown the form that made him one of the Rays' top prospects of late -- he's won back-to-back starts, lasting six innings in both, with a combined 19 strikeouts and only two earned runs allowed. Snell for his career is 0-0 with a 6.75 ERA in two outings against the Twins -- he has 14 strikeouts against only two walks, but last year gave up six runs on seven hits in just four innings.The Twins will counter with veteran right-hander Kyle Gibson, who is 1-0 with a 3.68 ERA, but hasn't made it through the fifth inning in either of his last two starts. He's struggled for his career against the Rays -- 1-4 with a 7.04 ERA, with only the Yankees (9.31) holding a higher ERA among the teams he's faced more than twice. He's given up 42 hits in 30 2/3 innings against Tampa Bay, with more walks (17) than strikeouts (15).Both teams had bullpen issues on Friday -- Romo gave up his first career grand slam in his 577th career appearance, and Duke's ERA rose to 9.53 in taking the loss in the 10th. Minnesota is still the AL Central leader at 8-6 -- they'd be six games back in the East and 2 1/2 in the West.The Rays can clinch a second straight series win with a victory Saturday, a small step as they work to dig themselves out of a deep early hole and get back to at least .500 baseball. Friday's winning run came off a hit from infielder Brad Miller, who had just been activated off the disabled list and was happy to provide a small spark."Brad came through with a nice hit and we just battled back," said teammate Denard Span. "I think that's a good character win. We showed a lot of grit tonight ... that for sure was a good, resilient character win right there."
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