CHICAGO — The Twins' habit of blowing leads reached a new level on Wednesday.
Minnesota rode 13 hits and three home runs into five different leads over the White Sox in the finale of a three-game series against the defending AL Central champions. But Chicago matched every hit, every homer and finally took a lead of its own when it mattered most.
With the Twins' infield drawn in, Leury Garcia grounded a single past a diving Jose Miranda at third base, scoring Eloy Jimenez to capture a 9-8 victory at Guaranteed Rate Field.
The loss snapped the Twins' seven-game winning streak against Chicago and prevented them from widening their division lead over Cleveland to a season-high 5 1/2 games. It also exacerbated their recent pattern of coughing up leads late in games.
Actually, they got an early start this time. Joe Ryan, who figured to have an outside shot at an All-Star berth, allowed a first-inning run after the Twins scored one themselves, and a two-run fourth-inning home run to Jimenez after the Twins strung together three hits against former Twin Lance Lynn to take a 3-1 lead.
Back and forth it went from that point, with Jorge Polanco twice hitting home runs and Gio Urshela lofting a two-run shot over the White Sox bullpen, only to see relievers Emilio Pagan, Griffin Jax and Trevor Megill allow game-tying runs, Pagan and Megill via home runs.
Each team's best reliever, Liam Hendriks for the White Sox and Jhoan Duran for the Twins, restored order with easy ninth innings, but only Chicago could keep up the back-and-forth pace in the 10th inning. Minnesota went scoreless despite having two runners on with no outs against Jose Ruiz, because Urshela struck out, and sub-.200-hitting Ryan Jeffers, hitting for himself despite the presence of Carlos Correa and Gary Sanchez on the bench, grounded into a double play.
That set up the White Sox' game-winning rally, particularly when Josh Harrison drew a walk off Jovani Moran and Jeffers allowed Jimenez to move up to third base with a passed ball.
