DETROIT — Almost every reliever in the Twins’ bullpen played a pivotal role on Saturday in the team capturing a pair of wins. On Sunday, that group got some reinforcements when its top left-hander, Caleb Thielbar, returned from the injured list.
But Thielbar’s return didn’t go quite to plan and the Twins bullpen, which had allowed just nine runs this season heading into Sunday, gave up four in the eighth inning, leading to a 4-3 loss in the series finale at Comerica Park.
Thielbar, brought in to protect a three-run lead, first allowed a solo home run to Javier Báez. Carson Kelly followed with a one-hopper to short that Willi Castro couldn’t corral. A Riley Greene single ended Thielbar’s season debut.
Enter Griffin Jax, the team’s most reliable arm out of the pen.
Jax got Mark Canha to ground to third, but the ball ate up Kyle Farmer, who tried to backhand it, and went into left field, scoring a pair of runners and tying the score. Spencer Torkelson followed with an RBI single, and all of a sudden, the three-run lead that the Twins had been protecting most of the day had gone up in flames.
That sent the Twins to a loss on a day when starting pitcher Bailey Ober did all he could in the six-plus innings he pitched. Ober was ahead in the count much of the day and economical with his pitches. He retired 14 straight batters at one point before a Torkelson double in the seventh inning ended his day.
The Twins led since the second inning when designated hitter Ryan Jeffers knocked in a pair of runs with a bases-loaded single. Catcher Christian Vázquez provided the Twins’ other run of the day, hitting his first home run of the season a couple of innings later.
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