SEATTLE — After what was almost assuredly their best win of the season on Friday, the Twins followed it up on Saturday with what was almost assuredly their strangest game of the season.
If a fire alarm blaring and flashing lights throughout the ballpark delaying the game for 10 minutes wasn’t enough, how about this? Star shortstop Carlos Correa was ejected for the first time in his career — and it happened from the on-deck circle.
The Twins saw their lead slip away late when J.P. Crawford blasted a two-run home run off reliever Jorge Alcala in the seventh inning but came back, again, with Trevor Larnach tying the game up in the ninth inning for the second consecutive day. Ultimately, though, after Griffin Jax stranded the bases loaded in the bottom of the ninth, and Jhoan Duran left a runner on third in the 10th, the Twin ended up falling 5-4 to the Seattle Mariners when a run scored on a Cole Young fielder’s choice in the 11th in a game that was filled with drama on Saturday at T-Mobile Park.
The Mariners’ walk-off came after Kody Clemens fought through an 11-pitch at-bat to deliver a single into center in the top of the 10th, but automatic runner Matt Wallner — fresh off the injured list from a hamstring strain — was thrown out trying to score from second on a bullet from center fielder Julio Rodríguez. Harrison Bader then grounded into an inning-ending double play to end the top of the 10th and the Twins were unable to convert in the 11th, too, despite plenty of good at-bats throughout.
“We did about everything in the book besides score,” manager Rocco Baldelli said. “You probably couldn’t try to do what we did and find a way to not put a run on the board.”
Both Baldelli and Correa were not around to see the end of it after home plate umpire Austin Jones, working in just his ninth game this season, tossed the shortstop during the middle of a Brooks Lee at-bat in the seventh inning. Jones had made a questionable strike call in Correa’s previous at-bat, Clemens was rung up on a low strike in the sixth and Larnach the same in the seventh.
And so, after the second straight borderline call of Lee’s seventh-inning at-bat, Correa said something that caught Jones’s attention.
“I said, ‘You’ve got to get them up. You’ve got to make an adjustment. You can’t call that all day,’” Correa recounted. “And then he threw me out.”
Correa was surprised by the decision because he felt he did not say anything that warranted an ejection. Crew chief Bill Miller told a pool reporter that Correa “was warned twice to stop,” but continued.
“He didn’t say anything bad,” Lee said. “Just let an umpire know that he’s doing a bad job.”
As an animated Correa moved closer to home plate, Baldelli sprung out of the dugout, wedging himself between the player and umpire. Three other members of the coaching staff came out to restrain Correa as Baldelli continued on with his argument, eventually throwing his hat in anger.
“There’s a reason why he’s only had one. He’s a pretty respectful guy,” Baldelli said. “I think it was a premature ejection, but it’s not my job to make those decisions, obviously. It’s the umpire’s job. He didn’t say anything personal.”
The seventh inning went from bad to worse for the Twins (31-26), who lost their star and then their lead.
Crawford got ahold of an Alcala fastball, sending it off the scoreboard ribbon in right field and erasing a lead that the Twins had been protecting since the second inning when Wallner, in his first major league at-bat since April 15, smacked a two-run home run. They added one more run in the inning when Willi Castro, who hit two home runs on Friday and had three hits on Saturday, drove in the Twins’ third run of the game.
Minnesota held onto that lead for much of the game, though the Mariners (31-26) chipped away an inning later when Cal Raleigh hit a two-run home run on a high fastball from Bailey Ober that was above the strike zone.
“He’s just on one right now,” Ober said of Raleigh, who hit two home runs a day earlier. “It’s hard to expect him to get a barrel to it, but he did.”
Ober’s start ended in the fifth inning at 97 pitches after he had allowed the first two batters of the inning to reach. Ober, who said he was “fighting some mechanical stuff,” in his start was bailed out of that jam, though, as Louie Varland stepped up, striking out Raleigh and Rodríguez before getting Randy Arozarena to fly out.
Arozarena would make a big play later in the game, catching a Clemens fly ball and then doubling Wallner off of second base, helping squelch a potential Twins’ rally in the eighth inning. But just like a night earlier, there was some more late-inning magic for the Twins in the ninth.
Byron Buxton, making things happen with his legs, wound up on third base when reliever Carlos Vargas threw away a chopper that he should have eaten. Larnach, with the infield drawn in, then tied the game up, poking a single past a diving second baseman into right field. But though they came back again, they couldn’t quite pull it off for the second straight night, finding themselves not rewarded for some good at-bats.
“We put a bunch of runs on the board yesterday. And our at-bats might have been somewhere in the same category today as they were yesterday, and we couldn’t find a way to score,” Baldelli said. “That’s life. I was really pleased. We hit the ball well. We made pretty good decisions at the plate. If we play like that tomorrow, offensively, we’re going to score a ton of runs.”
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