Jones Homers Twice, Drives In 5 As Tigers Beat Twins 9-3
DETROIT (AP) — JaCoby Jones homered twice and drove in a career-high five runs as the Detroit Tigers picked up a rare home win, beating the Minnesota Twins 9-3 on Saturday.
Jones is hitting .420 with four homers and 13 RBIs in his last 14 games, raising his batting average from .173 to .250.
Christin Stewart also homered for the Tigers, who had lost three straight and 13 of 14 at Comerica Park.
Nick Ramirez (2-0), Detroit's second pitcher in a bullpen game, gave up one run and three hits with three walks in three innings.
Kyle Gibson (6-3) gave up five runs and eight hits with two walks in five innings.
The Twins took a quick 1-0 lead in the first. Max Kepler started the game with a walk and Jorge Polanco followed with an RBI double off Tigers opener Buck Farmer.
Jones put the Tigers ahead with a three-run homer in the second, but Minnesota pulled to 3-2 against Ramirez in the third. Kepler walked again to start the inning, took second on Nelson Cruz's single and scored on C.J. Cron's base hit.
Stewart led off the bottom of the third with his fifth homer, and Harold Castro gave the Tigers a three-run lead with an RBI single in the fifth.
Cruz hit his 10th homer on Blaine Hardy's first pitch of the eighth inning. He has 19 regular-season homers against the Tigers to go along with the eight he has hit in nine postseason games against Detroit.
Jones hit a two-run homer to make it 7-3 in the bottom of the eighth and the Tigers added two more runs in the inning.
EIGHTY'S MAJOR-LEAGUE DEBUT
RHP Ryan Eades, called up from Triple-A Rochester before the game, made his debut by replacing Gibson for the sixth inning. He became the first player in major league history to wear No. 80 in a regular-season game.
Eades allowed two hits and two walks in two scoreless innings.
THREE HOLDOVERS FROM GARDY
Along with reliever Trevor May, Gibson and Polanco are the only players on the Twins roster who played for Tigers manager Ron Gardenhire in 2014, his last season as Minnesota's manager.
UP NEXT
The teams finish their three-game series on Sunday with Minnesota's Jake Odorizzi (8-2, 1.96) facing Detroit's Ryan Carpenter (1-2, 6.23). Odorizzi comes into the game on a 16 1/3-inning scoreless streak.
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