MINNEAPOLIS _ The Rays reached the official halfway mark of the regular season, and their year has very much been a tale of two separate chapters _ the hot start that carried them through the season's first two-plus months, and a month of June that has exposed all of their weaknesses.
The Rays ended their grueling 10-game road trip with their longest game of the season in Minnesota on Thursday, proving again that nothing's come easy for this team of late.
The 18 innings played by the Rays and Twins at Target Field matched the longest game by innings in Rays franchise history.
The Rays won a five-hour, 42-minute marathon, 5-2, against the American League-leading Twins. They went 15 innings between scoring runs _ managing just two hits over that stretch _ before plating three runs in the 18th.
Brandon Lowe scored the go-ahead run in the 18th inning on Yandy Diaz's sacrifice fly to left field, his left hand sweeping across home plate before catcher Mitch Garver's tag. Willy Adames and Ji-Man Choi then recorded back-to-back RBI singles.
They avoided being swept by the Twins, but still finished their three-city road trip to New York, Oakland and Minnesota with a 3-7 record. They have lost 11 of their last 16 games and are 11-15 in the month of June.
The win could still be costly. They used eight relievers on Thursday, and will surely need to make at least a roster move or two to replenish the bullpen.
Having said that, it would have been much worse had the Rays lost this game.
The Rays used all 13 position players. And when lefty Ryan Yarbrough, who logged three scoreless innings for the win, entered the game in the 16th inning, he was the 22nd players the Rays used Thursday, also matching a team record for the most players used in a non-expanded roster game.
The bullpen logged 16 scoreless innings after opener Ryan Stanek yielded two runs in the first.
The 22 strikeouts by Rays pitchers set a new club record, bettering 21 recorded in a 15-inning game against Oakland on July 30, 2012.
The Rays offense had its opportunities to win in the late innings. They were 0 for 5 with runners in scoring position in extra innings before the 18th.
The Rays loaded the bases with no outs in the 10th, but couldn't score, in part because of a Ji-Man Choi baserunning bumble on Joey Wendle's line drive hit to right.
Choi walked and Austin Meadows singled, and when Wendle rocketed a ball to the right field warning track that Jake Cave couldn't come up with, Choi initially retreated to second. Clogging the bases for the runners behind him, Choi was unable to score.
Still, the Rays had three opportunities to score the go-ahead run, but Brandon Lowe popped up, Travis d'Arnaud struck out and Tommy Pham was robbed on a diving play by third baseman Miguel Sano.
Through the end of May, the Rays' 3.40 bullpen ERA was the third best in baseball. In June, they entered Thursday with a 5.14 ERA, but on Thursday, the Rays pen did its job against a dangerous and deep Twins lineup.
After bulk reliever Jalen Beeks logged 3 1/3 scoreless innings, Rays reliever Chaz Roe entered in a tough situation in the sixth, with runners at the corners and one out, but it took him just two pitches to escape, inducing a 6-4-3 inning-ending double-play ball from Jonathan Schoop.
Lefty Colin Poche retired all four hitters he faced, including strikeouts of Jake Cave and Jorge Polanco, and right-hander Andrew Kittredge retired five of the six batters he faced, a run that began with back-to-backs strikeouts of Nelson Cruz and Garver.
Oliver Drake then retired all six batters he faced in the 10th and 11th, recording four strikeouts. Emilio Pagan struck out the side in the 12th, working around a two-out walk. After giving up a ground-rule double, lefty Adam Kolarek escaped the 13th by getting a 4-6-3 double play ball on his way to three scoreless frames.
Perez retired 16 straight Rays batters after allowing back-to-back RBI hits by Mike Brosseau and Guillermo Heredia in the second inning.
He held the Rays to three hits over seven innings, a nice rebound from his late outing against the Rays, when he was shelled for six runs over 2 2/3 innings on May 30 at Tropicana Field.
In the second inning, Perez issued a leadoff walk to Willy Adames. Three batters later, Brosseau doubled into the left-center gap with two outs to plate Adames. Heredia then lined a single down the right field line to tie the game at 2.
Stanek struggled early, allowing two runs in the first inning on three singles and a Heredia throwing error.
Back-to-back one-out singled by Jorge Polanco and Nelson Cruz put runners at the corners, and Garver's RBI ground out gave the Twins a 1-0 lead.
Cruz tried to score on Luis Arraez's single to right, but Heredia's throw to the plate had him beat, but it one-happed past Zunino, allowing Cruz to score.
