Resilient Twins break out for much-needed win with Trade Deadline looming

CLEVELAND -- With 60 games left in the season, and still nearly two weeks until the Trade Deadline, there simply is no such thing as a single must-win game.

But Wednesday night came awfully close.

Facing a four-game losing streak and the possibility of a second straight season hitting the rocks in the first week after the All-Star break, Minnesota righted the ship at a critical time. The Twins overcame an injury to Victor Caratini, a substandard start from Bailey Ober, the return of José Ramírez to Cleveland's lineup and yet another early deficit to claim a desperately needed 10-6 win over the Guardians at Progressive Field.

Brooks Lee and Trevor Larnach homered, the Twins rapped out 11 hits and also reached base via four walks, one hit batter and three Cleveland errors as the American League’s most productive offense returned to its usual self after a brief skid. And they did it with Byron Buxton receiving a scheduled day off and Caratini coming out of the game in the fifth inning after fouling a ball off his right knee.

“It was great,” said Ober, who allowed four runs in four innings. “Huge bounceback. They looked incredible out there today, and I think we needed that big time today -- just to get those guys rolling again. Another big output from them, especially in the second half of the season and [after] the All-Star break, it’s good to see.”

With Taj Bradley scheduled to start Thursday’s road-trip finale before a seemingly manageable homestand against the scuffling Athletics and Royals, there’s absolutely a chance for Wednesday’s win to start one more pre-Deadline surge. Twins players and staff are fully aware that they sit on the cusp between buying and selling at the Deadline, and the next 10 games will have an outsized influence on what the front office and ownership decide to do.

Twice already this season, the Twins have wobbled, falling to the edges of contention, before climbing back up the standings. It’s not too late to do that once more.

But if they’d lost Wednesday, that hill would have looked a good bit steeper.

Minnesota finds itself in third place in the AL Central, five games behind the division-leading White Sox, and three games behind Boston for the final AL Wild Card spot.

“It's easy to say now it was a big win for us,” said manager Derek Shelton. “We came out of the break and played well the first day, and [then] just did not play good baseball -- we didn't pitch very well -- for four days. … To be able to bounce back was a big win for us.”

Lee’s three-run homer off Slade Cecconi was the biggest blow, but the main story of the night was that the Minnesota offense looked like its usual relentless self. Larnach led off the game with a homer. Lee and Josh Bell drove in runs in the third to tie it up after the visitors had fallen behind.

And then in the fourth, a lineup that had scuffled just a bit for a few days broke out. Alan Roden reached on an error, Luke Keaschall singled and Alex Jackson singled to put the Twins ahead, 4-3. Larnach flied out to the warning track for the second out, but Lee made sure the Twins capitalized, jumping a first-pitch sinker and drilling it a Statcast-projected 401 feet and over the wall in straightaway center.

“We go up big, but we still have a lot of innings to play,” Lee said. “That was the [fourth] inning, so we still have a lot of game left. … I feel like we did a good job just continuing to create opportunities.”

The Twins did just that and never looked back, getting five strong innings from the bullpen and adding three more runs against the Cleveland relief corps in the eighth. After a stretch of some of their poorest baseball of the year, there was urgency, but no panic.

“I think every game we kind of play like that,” said right fielder Alan Roden. “So to single out tonight would be maybe reaching for that headline. I’m just glad we won."