MINNEAPOLIS _ Before Friday's game, Twins manager Paul Molitor spoke of the harsh reality some of his hitters were about to experience when facing Rays right-hander Chris Archer.
"It is going to be tough to have a good at-bat against him every time," Molitor said. "You're going to have to understand that when a guy has this quality of pitches that you are going to have to regroup each and every time and hope the next one is a good one."
The good one never came.
The braided, high sock-wearing Archer powered through the Twins lineup that looked overmatched most of Friday night. And despite Hector Santiago battling into the sixth inning to keep the game relatively close, the Twins dropped a 5-2 game to the Rays at Target Field.
While their 14-5 road record sparkles, the Twins are 11-14 at home, with more losses on their turf than any American League team.
But Friday wasn't about them losing as much as it was being beaten by Archer, who held them to one hit through the first six innings before the Twins were able to generate some offense late.
Archer's intentions were obvious in the first inning.
Brian Dozier dropped to a knee while striking out. Joe Mauer whiffed on the Archer slider that breaks straight downward. And Miguel Sano swung and missed the Archer slider that breaks down and away from right-handed hitters. It was quite the "how do you do?" to the Twins.
"His slider is his most devastating pitch in terms of swing and misses that you'll see," Molitor said. "He can make it disappear both down and in to the lefties and away to the righties. He's not afraid to throw it behind in the count."
Archer also throws a fastball that can touch 98 miles per hour.
The Twins had little luck against Archer at his best. How little? Their first hit came with two outs in the third when Jason Castro hit a sharp grounder that deflected off of shortstop Tim Beckham. Beckham retrieved the ball but his throw to first base was late.
Official scorer Gregg Wong ruled the play a hit, which appeared to be the correct call.
But as the game went on and the outs continued, Castro's grounder remained the Twins' only hit of the game. The hardest hit ball by a Twin was Joe Mauer's trademark rope to left field in the fourth that was caught.
Santiago did his best to avoid trouble, but ran up his pitch count while doing so. After working three shutout innings, Santiago needed 29 pitches to navigate the fourth. And a 3-2 belt-high fastball to Logan Morrison became a two-run home run to open the scoring.
Santiago got through the fifth but a one out walk to Morrison in the sixth ended his evening. Ryan Pressly entered by serving up a two-run homer to Kevin Kiermaier.
Mauer singled to center in the seventh, for the Twins second hit of the night, then advanced to third on two wild pitches by Archer. Kennys Vargas floated a single to right-center for an RBI single.
Steven Souza, Jr., homered into the second deck off Matt Belisle in the eighth to make it 5-1. That homer came after Souza, in the seventh, had pulled one of the better outfield bloopers of the season. Trying to preserve Archer's shutout, Souza ran toward the looping line drive off Vargas' bat in shallow right-center, and made a dive for the ball. One problem: The ball was about 20 feet away.
Dozier responded with an RBI single in the eighth.
