MINNEKeynoteUSAOLIS — Detroit Tigers second baseman Colt Keith swung so aggressively that his helmet didn’t stay on his head. As a result, he hit the ball 426 feet into the second deck in right-center field for his fifth home run of his rookie season.
Keith jogged around the bases without a helmet.
Keith’s Fourth of July fireworks looked pretty, but a deluge of runs — and then an actual deluge — left the Tigers with an ugly 12-3 loss to the Minnesota Twins in Thursday’s finale of the three-game series at Target Field, all because right-hander Kenta Maeda struggled again.
“I feel bad,” Maeda said in Japanese, through interpreter Daichi Sekizaki. “I feel like I let the team down. I think it was a result of my body language.”
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Maeda had already been penalized for several runs when it began to rain in Minneapolis, but umpires kept the game going into the seventh inning. Ultimately, umpires stopped play and, after a brief rain delay, the game was called with two outs in the bottom of the seventh.
With Thursday’s loss, the Tigers (39-48) have now lost seven of their last eight series. Additionally, the Tigers have not won two straight since winning three straight from June 2-4. Since then, they have lost 18 of 26 games.
Maeda signed a two-year, $24 million contract with the Tigers, with $14 million due in 2024 and $10 million in 2025. President of baseball operations Scott Harris had hoped Maeda would help young pitchers learn to control their pitches.
He has a 6.71 ERA in 15 starts.
“We’ve got to get control back,” manager AJ Hinch said. “With Kenta, it all starts and ends with control. … The way he’s effective is by dominating the strike zone. He doesn’t fall behind or get into bad counts or miss in the middle. We need to improve his control to be the pitcher he can be.”
This time, the 36-year-old allowed nine runs on nine hits and three walks with three strikeouts in 3⅔ innings, throwing 88 pitches. The 36-year-old continues to increase the velocity of his fastball, but he can’t control any of his pitches.
Maeda blew a three-run lead.
Keith made it 1-0 by connecting on a slider from right-hander Bailey Ober for a solo home run with two strikes and one out in the first inning. The 426-foot shot marked the longest home run of his career.
“It was really good,” Keith said. “I just wanted to get in time for the fastball, and he ended up hanging a slider. I was able to hit it out of the park.”
In a 50-game stretch dating to May 1, Keith is hitting .281 with all five of his home runs.
The Tigers added two more runs in the second inning for a 3-0 lead, thanks to a two-strike, two-out double by Jake Rogers.
From there, everything fell apart for the Tigers.
Kenta Maeda fights
The Twins torched Maeda, who pitched for the Twins from 2020 to 2023, for two runs in the second inning, three runs in the third inning and four runs in the fourth inning.
In the third inning, the Twins took a 4-3 lead when Max Kepler hit a two-run single with two outs. An infield single by Manuel Margo increased the Twins’ lead to 5-3 in the third.
“I have to get hitters offsides, especially with two strikes,” Maeda said. “Those two-strike pitches need to be better. My strikeout rate is down this year. Hopefully, if I can get those pitches back, that will go up.”
The Twins broke the game open in the fourth inning after Maeda retired the first two batters. He then issued two walks, setting up Jose Miranda’s two-run double off Maeda’s slider and Ryan Jeffers’ two-run homer off Maeda’s splitter.
The score was 9-3 when Maeda left the mound.
Miranda finished 5-for-5 with three RBIs, three doubles and two singles. Jeffers was 3-for-4 with four RBIs and Kepler was 2-for-4 with two RBIs, providing the other multi-hit performances for the Twins.
Meanwhile, Maeda generated 11 strikeouts on 41 swings (a 26.8% strikeout rate) with five sliders, one splitter, two sinkers, one sweeper and two cutters. He entered Thursday’s start averaging 22% strikeouts in his first 15 outings, much worse than last year’s 28.2% in 21 games.
More bad pitches
Left-handed reliever Joey Wentz replaced Maeda in the fourth inning and went 2⅓ innings. He allowed two runs (one earned) on three hits and three walks with one strikeout.
The Twins took an 11-3 lead on Jeffers’ two-run single on a groundout to Wentz. Only one runner should have scored, but Wentz threw the ball away, allowing the second runner to score on the play.
Right-handed reliever Shelby Miller allowed a run in the seventh inning, making it 12-3, and hit a batter in the head because a pitch went out of his hand. After that, the game entered its final rain stoppage.
Wentz has a 5.11 ERA; Miller has a 6.41 ERA.
Contact Evan Petzold at epetzold@freepress.com or follow him @EvanPetzold.
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