Twins 5, White Sox 2: Outhomered at home

The Minnesota Twins entered the final game of this four-game series having scored five runs per game, and all with the home run.

That's no less true after today's affair. Jose Quintana gave up a pair of homers in the fifth inning that spelled his demise, and it was all the Twins needed to take the series. The total: 20 runs on 11 homers.

But Quintana's afternoon took a turn for the worse after losing a battle to Doug Bernier, of all people.

With one out in the fifth, Quintana got ahead 0-2 on the Minnesota utiltyman, but Bernier hung in there, fouling off three pitches until he drew a walk on the ninth pitch. That turned over the lineup, and two pitches later, Brian Dozier got his hands in on a cutter that wasn't quite inside enough, pulling it into the White Sox bullpen for a 3-0 lead.

The Twins weren't done, though. Jamey Carroll dropped a single over Gordon Beckham's head to keep the rally going, and Joe Mauer pulled a fastball over the wall in right-center to give the Twins a 5-0 lead.

The White Sox took their shots at the fences, but didn't have the same luck. Beckham, Conor Gillaspie and Blake Tekotte all had well-struck balls that a stiff wind from left field knocked down. They finally figured it out in the ninth, as Adam Dunn challenged the wind with a blast and dropped it a few rows deep over the right-center wall for a solo shot, and Gillaspie took a more direct route over the right-field wall.

Leading up to that brief outburst off Casey Fien, the Sox didn't have much.

They probably should've done more against Kevin Correia, considering this what he had done over his previous three starts:

• 9⅔, 24 H, 14 R, 14 ER, 4 BB, 5 K, 1 HR

But today?

• 7 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, 0 HR
  

It's one thing to run into some bad wind luck, but Correia tied his season-high in strikeouts, and that's a bigger problem. Dunn (0-for-3, two strikeouts) and Tyler Flowers (1-for-3, two strikeouts) had big problems picking him up in particular.

And even when the Sox started something, they couldn't find a way to sustain it. Alejandro De Aza killed his own rally by leading off the third with a double, then running into an out at third base on a grounder hit in front of him.

That was a small part of a big day of random events for De Aza. In the eighth inning, he jai-alai'd a sinking liner which allowed Justin Morneau to take second. It was a really tough play and De Aza made an incredible effort, but you don't often see the ball come out of a glove like that. But he made up for it by making a leaping catch on Josh Willingham's bullet, and Morneau didn't score.

In the bottom of the inning, he struck out on a foul tip ... off the knob of his bat. That'll teach kids to choke up. The same thing almost happened to Gordon Beckham one batter later, but it was a foul tip off the handle of his bat that on an awkward check-up attempt. The ball wasn't caught, but that didn't offer much comfort to Beckham, according to his expression.

Bullet points:

*Avisail Garcia went 1-for-4 with a single, and it was of the infield variety ... on the right side of the infield. Then he used that motor to record his first career stolen base.

*Dylan Axelrod threw four easy, scoreless innings to save the bullpen, which a manager always appreciates.

Record: 44-72 | Box score | Play-by-play | Highlights