Twins 4, Rays 7: Sonny Gray Notches 1,500th Career Strikeout Despite Tough Outing

[Nate Palmer]

A short Sonny Gray start and a strong Tyler Glasnow start set the tone for the Twins night that resulted in a loss. 

Image courtesy of © Jesse Johnson-USA TODAY Sports

Box Score
SP: Sonny Gray: 4.0 IP, 6 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K (89 pitches, 55 strikes (61.8%)
Home Runs: Max Kepler (22), Royce Lewis (12)
Bottom 3 WPA: Dylan Floro (-0.243), Carlos Correa (-0.124), Willi Castro(-0.115)

Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs) 

The Minnesota Twins have an opportunity this week to test them in a series against the final playoff-caliber team on their schedule. While a whole series is ahead of the two teams, the first game did not go the Twins way. 

Sonny not Sharp
As Sonny Gray took the mound Monday evening, he has looked like an American League Cy Young candidate most of the season. With another Cy Young candidate on the other side of the slate, Monday night was not Gray's night as the Rays nibbled away at him throughout his outing. The Rays didn’t exactly hit Gray hard, but singles, hit batters, and fielding miscues did Gray in. 

The first run was scored on a pair of bloop singles, a ball that kicked away from Ryan Jeffers, and another single delivered by Josh Lowe. The rest of Gray’s outing would be very similar, with no other loud damage being done. There would be an unearned run scored courtesy of Randy Arozarena, who reached on a fielding error, advanced to second on a fielder’s choice, and eventually landed on third via a wild pitch in time for Jose Siri to single him home for the Rays second run. 

While Gray left the game with two Rays runs on the board, he only made it four innings. The rest of the game was on the Twins bullpen’s shoulders, beginning with Dylan Floro. 

Bullpen Couldn’t Carry
As Floro took the mound, the hits from the Rays looked much the same. Nothing too hard or to cause too much concern, until with two runners on Floro gave up his first home run as a Twin. Taylor Walls hit a three-run home run to put the Rays up 5-2. 

Since being exchanged for Jorge Lopez, Floro came into tonight tossing 12.2 innings for the Twins. That has led him to a 4.97 ERA and a .314 batting average against. Neither are encouraging numbers for a reliever on a playoff-bound team. 

Diaz and Glasnow with Big Nights 
Two Rays players had big nights. Yandy Diaz was a catalyst of the Rays offense, collecting four hits in his first four at-bats. All of it was accented by a solo home run in the sixth inning off of Twins reliever Brent Headrick. 

While Glasnow’s final line will not look clean, that doesn’t quite tell the entire story of how the Rays starter took care of the Twins. It all started as Glasnow nearly tossed an immaculate inning in the first. Instead of getting three strikeouts on nine pitches, he needed a tenth pitch to get the three strikeouts. 

Glasnow had a hiccup in the fourth inning when he let up a big home run with Max Kepler at the plate. Kepler remains one of the most valuable Twins bats and fielders down the season's stretch. Since the All-Star break, Kepler has held a .900 OPS even after cooling down a bit since the beginning of September. 

Enter Royce Lewis
Above, it was mentioned that Glasnow’s final line wouldn’t reflect his dominance against the Twins. That is all due to what happened in the 6th inning. And as usual, a big spot found Royce Lewis, and Royce Lewis did Royce Lewis things. With two runners on, Lewis hit his own three-run blast with an exit velocity of 112.9 mph. 

Lewis’ homerun would make the sixth inning Glasnow’s final. While he gave up four earned runs to the Twins, he also struck out eight Twins batters. 

Gray Hits Career Mark
While Gray will be in no mood to celebrate after his performance Monday evening. He did make it to 1,500 career strike outs in the first inning. After Monday's game, Gray has 165 strikeouts for the season. 

What’s Next?
Joe Ryan takes the mound for the Twins for Tuesday’s game. Since returning from the IL, Ryan has a 2.40 ERA in three starts. On the other side, the Rays will send old friend Zach Littell out for the start. The one-time dominant reliever for the Twins will make his 12th start of 2023 for the Rays.

 

Postgame Interviews

 

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

 

	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN	MON	TOT
Headrick	0	0	0	0	47	47
Winder	0	0	0	0	38	38
Floro	0	0	11	0	24	35
Jax	0	8	0	24	0	32
Thielbar	0	15	10	0	0	25
Varland	0	0	20	0	0	20
Funderburk	0	0	15	0	0	15
Durán	0	14	0	0	0	14
Pagán	0	11	0	0	0	11

 

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[Mike Sixel]

Floro is off the playoff roster, right? 

[jkcarew]

“the Rays will send old friend Zach Littell out for the start. The one-time dominant reliever for the Twins…”

Which is to say…

the guy that was pretty good for about 27 low leverage innings across 3 months in 2019. And pretty much catastrophically horrible otherwise.

Also, it’s ZACK Littell.

[jkcarew]

27 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

Floro is off the playoff roster, right? 

Jorge Alcala started rehabbing a couple of days ago.

(fingers crossed)

[jorgenswest]

36 minutes ago, Mike Sixel said:

Floro is off the playoff roster, right? 

They need to find someone better in order for that to happen. I am hoping that Alcala, Paddack, Ober and Stewart will be healthy so he is not needed.

The loss tonight was a team effort though. Errors. Passed balls on strikes. Running into outs on bases. In Floro’s case the inning is very different if Kirilloff makes the correct play and takes the ball to first base himself. His inning should have started with one out. The same thing yesterday where Wallner didn’t make a play when Jax entered. I think Correa also started off an inning with an error. If they make the plays tonight it is a different outcome. When they don’t, pitch counts escalate and runs score.

[jkcarew]

I don’t think Glasnow was the story for TB pitching-wise, was he?
I’m quite satisfied with what the lineup was able to do against him. 8 baserunners over 6 innings, and half those baserunners scored thanks to the long ball. 4 runs over six innings. If Glasnow had those results every outing…where is the Rays AAA affiliate?

The story for the Rays was their bullpen…completely shut the Twins down and out over the final 3 innings.

[stringer bell]

Giants walked off the Guardians on a Wade Jr. single. Magic number is 11 and we will have to count down on both Cleveland and Detroit. 

[RickOShea]

The race is on.  Will Minnesota win the division title before Cleveland and or Detroit outright lose it?  Addition by subtraction, at its finest.

[rwilfong86]

I'd rather see Sonny flop and only go 4 last night than in his first playoff start. 

[Nine of twelve]

jorgenswest pointed out Kirilloff’s mistake in the fifth inning. He would have gotten the out by committing to handling the play himself. The three-run home run would not have then occurred because the inning would have ended before it happened. It was a classic rookie mistake (that I hope is a lesson learned) that turned out to be the difference in the game. Floro deserved better. Even though the three runs show up on the stat sheet as earned runs it was a fielding mistake that allowed them to score. 

[Doctor Wu]

6 hours ago, jorgenswest said:

They need to find someone better in order for that to happen. I am hoping that Alcala, Paddack, Ober and Stewart will be healthy so he is not needed.

That's the key. Replace Floro, for sure, but we need someone better to replace him. Hopefully, one or more of those rehabbing arms will help a weary bullpen. 

[Patzky]

6 hours ago, jkcarew said:

I don’t think Glasnow was the story for TB pitching-wise, was he?
I’m quite satisfied with what the lineup was able to do against him. 8 baserunners over 6 innings, and half those baserunners scored thanks to the long ball. 4 runs over six innings. If Glasnow had those results every outing…where is the Rays AAA affiliate?

The story for the Rays was their bullpen…completely shut the Twins down and out over the final 3 innings.

The Twins recipe for success lately outside Giolito has been to wait out the opposing starter and then attack the bullpen. Doesn't work against the Rays whose bullpen is foolproof.. no runs given up in 24 innings and counting. Hope they can hit Littell and get a big lead Tuesday.

[mikelink45]

Floro has to go, but we also cannot count or Headrick.  We have to hope for three new arms in the pen - Winder mopped up, but he is not one I would count on in playoffs. 

I wish Stevenson would get hot - he is very expendable at this point. 

And I want to apologize to Kepler fans, I thought he was washed up, but this second half is the Kepler we were expecting after his break out year.

And not enough accolades can be showered on Lewis!~

[TwinsDr2021]

3 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

I wish Stevenson would get hot - he is very expendable at this point. 

And not enough accolades can be showered on Lewis!~

This is why you can't judge what a 29 year old is doing in AAA, he is 29 and in AAA for a reason.

100% agree on Lewis, He is 4th on the team in RBI while only playing 50 games, Everybody but Polanco should be embarrassed by that. (Correa, Kepler, Taylor, Buxton, Gallo talking to you)

[JD-TWINS]

Apology: Kepler deserves a bunch of support the rest of the year after the past 90 days of him playing very good baseball!!

October Pen……8 guys:

Varland - right?

1 of Maeda or Ryan depending upon how they look over next 3 weeks.

Pagan - Jax - Thielbar - Duran are all locks.

Funderburk.

That’s 7 guys…….no Floro, no Sands, no Headrick, & no Winder.

Alcala & Paddack are very doubtful due to short runway to be ready in situations.

Kuechel or Stewart, assuming Stewart can get 2-3 outings in from September 20 - October1.

I think it’s Kuechel.

[Karbo]

This FO did a great job building depth for this year everywhere but the pen. That is a big problem heading into October. I hope Stewart can come back in time. I anticipate Lopez, Gray and Ryan will be the starters for the 1st round, which may leave Ober available for the pen. If Stewart gets healthy then it isn't quite as scary.

[MMMordabito]

AAAAndrew Stevenson can be kicked to the curb. Next.

[Linus]

Lots of blame to go around on this loss. Special mention to Jeffers for one of the worst baserunning plays I’ve ever seen. 

[Woof Bronzer]

9 hours ago, jkcarew said:

the guy that was pretty good for about 27 low leverage innings across 3 months in 2019. And pretty much catastrophically horrible otherwise.

 

And yet, there he was in a high leverage situation in Game 1 of the wild card series, taking the L while failing to record an out.   

Can't hide bullpen arms....

[jorgenswest]

39 minutes ago, MMMordabito said:

AAAAndrew Stevenson can be kicked to the curb. Next.

A guy who works so hard to get back to the majors and by all accounts is a valuable teammate. That guy deserves more respect. We can do better here.

[MMMordabito]

5 hours ago, jorgenswest said:

A guy who works so hard to get back to the majors and by all accounts is a valuable teammate. That guy deserves more respect. We can do better here.

Is that better?

[jorgenswest]

1 hour ago, MMMordabito said:

Is that better?

No

[mnfireman]

This is the type of game a play-off team needs to win (especially if its in the play-offs) - the starter struggled, but left the only giving up 2 runs through 4, and the offense rallies to score 4 runs against the other teams starter. However, the BP immediately gave up 5 runs, which may have kept the opposing SP in through 6, to make it difficult to win. 

This team has just under 3 weeks to get things figured out, with the BP being most concerning.

[mnfireman]

10 hours ago, Patzky said:

The Twins recipe for success lately outside Giolito has been to wait out the opposing starter and then attack the bullpen. 

They got to Glasnow for 4 last night.