4/4: Twins Lose Eighth Straight Opening Day to Baltimore Orioles

The Minnesota Twins lost their eighth-straight Opening Day to the Baltimore Orioles Monday night, the longest streak since the Oakland Athletics lost 10-straight from 2005-14.

Kevin Jepsen issued a two-out walk to Chris Davis, and Matt Wieters scored him for the first walk-off win in Major League Baseball this season.

“Two-out walks. It happens. You look up across baseball, [when] you give up two-out walks, they tend to score,” Jepsen told the Star Tribune. “My mindset all spring was not walking guys, and you see it there — that’s why.”

The day itself was discombobulated. The Orioles chose to start the game 1 hour and 40 minutes late, even though there was no rain during that time period, and then delayed it again for an hour and 10 minutes after two rainy innings.

“It was way, way off script for an Opening Day,” Twins manager Paul Molitor told the Pioneer Press. “They had the same scenario we did. Some miscalculation on how we were going to be affected by weather, obviously. Just kind of the way it unfolded.”

Ryan Pressly, Fernando Abad and Trevor May pitched multiple scoreless innings in relief of starter Ervin Santana, who was pulled after the second rain delay.

Casey Fien gave up four hits and two runs in the fifth inning, but the Twins closed the gap in the seventh with two runs against Baltimore reliever Mychal Givens.

Eddie Rosario hit a one-out double, Byung Ho Park was hit with a pitch and Eduardo Escobar hit a double off the right-field fence to score Rosario. Kurt Suzuki scored Park on a long foul ball to left field that rookie Joey Rickard caught in the stands and Park tagged up on.

“This obviously isn’t how we assumed Opening Day was going to go — for either team,” Jepsen told the Pioneer Press. “It was a grind. Baseball is a grind.”

[Star Tribune, Pioneer Press]

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