MINNEAPOLIS — Chicago White Sox starter Davis Martin went to a full count with Royce Lewis in the first inning Friday at Target Field.
Martin threw a slider low and inside. Lewis pulled it to left for a two-run homer.
It was the first of three two-run home runs for the Minnesota Twins, who extended the White Sox’s franchise-record losing streak to 18 games with a 10-2 rout in front of 30,801 at Target Field.
“It’s a really good offense and we gave them a little too many free opportunities on the basepaths,” Martin said. “Two four-pitch walks and a walk to (Byron) Buxton as well when that happens, damage is multiplied. Too many free passes and the mistakes got multiplied.”
The Sox are one shy of matching the 2021 Baltimore Orioles and 2005 Kansas City Royals for the longest major-league losing streak since 1994. They’ve been outscored 112-39 during the skid.
At 27-85, the Sox are 58 games under .500 for the first time in franchise history.
The Sox were in the game most of the night until the Twins scored six in the eighth, which included two-run homers by Willi Castro against reliever Steven Wilson and Buxton against Prelander Berroa.
“My mentality with that was even though we haven’t come back and won late this year (0-68 when trailing after eight going into Friday), and with their bullpen, that’s probably one of the better bullpens in baseball, I still wanted to take a shot at it and bring Wilson in the game,” manager Pedro Grifol said. “It just didn’t work out that way.”
Miguel Vargas had a two-run homer for the Sox, his first hit since being acquired Monday from the Los Angeles Dodgers. That tied the score at 2 in the third.
But Lewis drove in two more in the bottom of the third with a double. He had two hits and four RBIs.
“He hits mistakes,” Martin said of Lewis. “If you leave something over the middle of the plate, he hits it. We wanted to do some stuff, we didn’t execute very well and he capitalized on it.”
Martin allowed four runs on six hits with five strikeouts and three walks in 3⅔ innings in his first start for the Sox since Oct. 5, 2022, against the Twins. He underwent Tommy John surgery after three starts for Triple-A Charlotte last season and just returned to the major leagues on July 27, allowing one run in 2⅔ relief innings.
He threw 75 pitches Friday, 43 of which were strikes.
“Two sides to the story, also excited because 14 months of hard work and to get back in the rotation, but the competitor in me is really frustrated right now,” Martin said. “It’s not the start I want, it’s not who I am, walking people, very frustrating.”
Grifol said Martin “threw the ball OK, made a couple of mistakes to Lewis. One on a slider, one on a fastball, and he’s a pretty damn good hitter. He did what he’s supposed to do with it.”
“I thought (Martin) got some swing and misses today on the cutter against left-handed hitters, that’s new to his arsenal,” Grifol said. “That’s going to really help him against left-handed hitters. But at the end of the day, the walks got him and a couple pitches that he left out over.
“The thing with him is we’ve got to continue just to build him up, build up that work capacity, just to make sure we get him up to 80, 85, 90 pitches so he can give us some length, which is what we need.”
The Sox were limited to three hits by Joe Ryan and three relievers. One batter reached base in the final four innings, a seventh-inning walk by Andrew Benintendi, as the Sox dropped to 1-10 against the Twins this season.
