Edouard Julien homered twice as the Twins belted five home runs and completing a four-game series sweep of the Chicago White Sox with a 6-3 victory on Thursday afternoon in Minneapolis.
It was the second multi-homer game of the season for Julien. Ryan Jeffers, Carlos Santana and Jose Miranda also homered and Trevor Larnach went 2-for-4 with a run scored for Minnesota which won for the fifth time in its last six games.
Cole Sands (1-0) picked up the win with an inning of hitless relief and Griffin Jax picked up his fourth save.
Andrew Vaughn doubled and had two hits and a run scored and Korey Lee also had two hits for Chicago which lost its seventh straight game and ninth in a row at Target Field. Tanner Banks (0-1), who gave up a run on three consecutive singles without retiring a batter, suffered the loss in relief.
Chicago took a 1-0 lead in the second inning against Minnesota starter Simeon Woods Richardson who was making his first career start at Target Field. Eloy Jimenez led off the inning with the walk and Robbie Grossman and Vaughn followed with back-to-back singles to load the bases with no outs. Kevin Pillar then drove in Jimenez with a sacrifice fly but Woods Richardson got out of the jam with back-to-back strikeouts of Paul DeJong and Lee.
The White Sox made it 2-0 in the fourth when Vaughn doubled to the gap in right-center and came around to score one out later on a single by DeJong, who snapped an 0-for-15 streak with the hit.
Minnesota claimed a 3-2 lead in the sixth inning.
Julien led off with a 412-foot homer to left-center. On the next pitch, Jeffers connected for his fourth homer this season, a line drive into the front row of the bleachers in left that chased starter Michael Soroka.
Larnach greeted Banks with a single, advanced to second on a check-swing infield single by Max Kepler and then scored the go-ahead run on a single by Willi Castro.
Julien made it 4-2 in the seventh with his seventh homer of the season, a line drive into the flower bed in left. The Twins added two more runs in the eighth off reliever Steven Wilson on back-to-back two-out home runs by Santana and Miranda.
Chicago loaded the bases with one out in the ninth against reliever Steven Okert. Jax then came in to strike out Jimenez but Lopez scored when Grossman’s grounder went off the glove of Santana for an error to make it 6-3. Vaughn grounded out to second to end the game.
–Field Level Media
