Rosario’s 3rd HR a walk-off winner

MINNEAPOLIS — After suffering through a historic streak of walk-off losses, the Twins reversed the trend Sunday.

Eddie Rosario hit his third home run of the game, launching a two-run shot in the bottom of the ninth to lift the Twins over the Indians 7-5.

On Tuesday, the Twins tied the 1968 Pirates and 2010 Mariners with their eighth walk-off loss in their first 50 games.

“As many as we’ve experienced, we haven’t had a lot of those chances to see the homeplate celebrations,” Twins mangoing, ager Paul Molitor said. “The right guy did it.”

Rosario became the first Twins player with two three-homer games as his team beat the AL Central leaders for the third straight day.

Indians closer Cody Allen walked Brian Dozier to lead off the ninth. Then he fell behind Rosario 2-1. Rosario knew Allen couldn’t afford to put another runner on.

“After he threw me a second ball, I knew he was going to throw me a fastball,” said Rosario.

“It was up, and he throws 95, but I stayed through the ball. I didn’t know where the ball was but I wanted to try to finish the game.”

Rosario, who began the day with 10 home runs, hit a solo homer in the first inning and another solo drive in the seventh. Dozier also homered for the Twins, whose struggling offense erupted for 29 runs in the fourgame series.

Twins starter Kyle Gibson was perfect through four innings. But Edwin Encarnacion led off the fifth with the first of his two home runs.

“Coming through like that with a walk-off was a big win in this series,” said Gibson, who struck out seven in 5 ⁄ innings.