Twins lose again to Brewers; Gomez haunts former team

The Milwaukee Brewers, who entered the weekend with the worst record in the National League, took their second straight win over the Twins on Saturday with a 4-2 victory at Target Field. Former Twin Carlos Gomez went 4 for 4 for the Brewers in the win.

Twins Notes: THE TWINS lost only their sixth series of the season and their first since dropping two of three at Detroit May 12-14…the loss was the Twins fifth in their last 14 games…despite the defeat, they are still 23-11 since April 30…Minnesota dropped to 19-9 at Target Field…the announced crowd of 38,707 was the second sellout of the season (Opening Day – 40, 123) and the 154th in Target Field history.

· J.R. GRAHAM went 4.0 innings and gave up one run on six hits with no walks and three strikeouts, throwing 63 pitches (45 for strikes) in his first career start…he has given up only one earned run in his last 10.2 innings, since May 17, a span covering four appearances…Graham has also walked just one hitter in his last 13.2 innings, a span covering six appearances.

· JOE MAUER (2-for-4) beat out an infield single in the fourth inning for the Twins first hit…he has now reached base via hit, walk, or hit-by-pitch in 30 straight interleague games, the third longest interleague on-base streak in Twins history, as only Matt Lawton (37 – 6/5/99-7/12/01) and Justin Morneau (28 – 6/12/07-6/13/09) had longer…he later added a game-tying RBI single, Mauer is a career .335 (217-for-648) hitter in 174 career Interleague games.

· BRIAN DOZIER (2-for-4, two runs) had two more extra-base hits, with a sixth inning double and eighth inning homer…he has 18 doubles, a team-high 11 home runs, three triples, totaling 32 extra-base hits…his 18 doubles in 54 games this year are more than half of the 33 he hit in both 2013 and 2014 in 147 and 156 games respectively…in fact, he is on pace for 53…16 of his last 22 hits have gone for extra-bases… over his last 14 games, Dozier is hitting .316 (18-for-57) with eight doubles, four home runs, eight RBI and 16 runs scored.

· EDDIE ROSARIO (2-for-4) threw out Carlos Gomez at second base in the third inning for his third outfield assist this season, and his first in right field (previous two came in left field)…he came into play today only one behind Tampa Bay’s Steven Souza and Toronto’s Dalton Pompey for the lead among AL rookies…as a team, the Twins have 15 outfield assists on the season, and their 14 entering today was tied for third in the AL and all of baseball…at the plate, Rosario he had his fifth multi-hit game of his career…he has hit safely in 10 his last 11 games, batting .350 (14-for-40) in that span.

· TORII HUNTER (1-for-3) extended his Target Field hitting streak to seven games with a fifth inning single…he has hit safely in 16 of his last 18 home games, batting .301 (22-for-73) with 14 RBI in that span….Hunter has hits in 14 of his last 15 games overall, hitting .305 (18-for-59) with 15 RBI in that stretch.