Jose Berrios struggles again as lowly Tigers rough up Twins
Pitching woes continued for the Twins Friday night as the Tigers pounded out 17 hits in a 9-6 win at Target Field.
Jose Berrios scattered five hits and a walk through five innings before the wheels came off. The All-Star right-hander gave up three singles, a double and a grand slam to Ronny Rodriguez in the sixth inning as the Tigers erased a 3-0 deficit and took a 5-3 lead that they wouldn't relinquish.
Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said after the game that Berrios will make his next start as scheduled, and there's no talk of giving the right-hander a break.
“His raw stuff is back,” Baldelli said. “His velocity is good. His breaking ball is good, and the execution just wasn't.”
Berrios has allowed 20 runs in 21.1 innings this month, which equates to an 8.44 ERA.
The Twins built a 3-0 lead on a stinging RBI double from Nelson Cruz in the first, followed by solo homers from Miguel Sano and Jake Cave in the second and third innings, respectively.
Sano and Cave would each finish the night with two homers. Sano is up to 25 on the season while Cave has four.
Meanwhile, most other Twins bats were swinging and missing. Tigers right-hander Drew VerHagen struck out 11 over six innings.
The Tigers scored twice on three hits against Sergio Romo in the eighth and plated two more runs on three hits against Ryne Harper in the ninth.
Minnesota's lead in the AL Central is down to 2.5 games entering play Saturday.
Up next: Twins vs. Tigers, Saturday at 6:10 p.m.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.