{"id":580712,"date":"2026-04-04T01:20:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T01:20:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/580712\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T01:20:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T01:20:08","slug":"minnesota-twins-win-home-opener-over-tampa-bay-rays-behind-tristan-grays-first-grand-slam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/580712\/","title":{"rendered":"Minnesota Twins win home opener over Tampa Bay Rays behind Tristan Gray\u2019s first grand slam"},"content":{"rendered":"

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 Tristan Gray<\/a> hit his first career grand slam to cap a seven-run seventh inning for the Minnesota Twins<\/a> in a cold and rainy 10-4 home-opener victory over the Tampa Bay Rays<\/a> on Friday.<\/p>\n

Gray\u2019s one-out line drive off a 1-1 cutter from Yeondrys G\u00f3mez was just high enough to clear the 23-foot wall in right field, after Kevin Kelly<\/a> (0-1) finished a rough relief appearance with consecutive bases-loaded walks. <\/p>\n

Josh Bell<\/a> had two hits and two RBIs for the Twins, including the tiebreaking single in the seventh. Kelly started that inning by hitting Byron Buxton<\/a> in the right forearm with a pitch, forcing the All-Star center fielder out of the game. The Twins announced X-rays showed no fracture.<\/p>\n

Gray, who also had a sacrifice fly, grabbed the last available roster spot on opening day as a backup infielder. He homered three times in 30 games for the Rays last season.<\/p>\n

After a soggy afternoon and a downtown power outage, the game started an hour late with a first-pitch temperature of 38 degrees and finished in hard rain.<\/p>\n

With Joe Boyle<\/a> at 6-foot-8 for the Rays and Bailey Ober<\/a> at 6-foot-9 for the Twins, the starting pitchers would have made quite a frontcourt matchup in a pickup basketball game. The duel on the mound was so-so.<\/p>\n

Ober lasted four innings for the second straight start, falling behind after a two-out, two-run single by Nick Fortes<\/a> in the first and a two-out, run-scoring double by Ben Williamson<\/a> in the fourth.<\/p>\n

Boyle had nine strikeouts over 5 1\/3 innings, but Williamson flubbed a tailor-made double-play grounder to shortstop that would\u2019ve preserved a 3-1 lead to end the fourth. The Rays made three errors and lead the major leagues with 10, six by third baseman Junior Caminero<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Kody Funderburk<\/a> (1-1) got the final out in the top of the seventh to earn the win.<\/p>\n

Up next<\/p>\n

LHP Steven Matz<\/a> starts for Tampa Bay on Saturday against Minnesota RHP Mick Abel<\/a>.<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP MLB: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/mlb<\/p>\n

Dave Campbell, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MINNEAPOLIS (AP) \u2014 Tristan Gray hit his first career grand slam to cap a seven-run seventh inning for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":580713,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-580712","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mlb","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-mlb","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580712","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=580712"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/580712\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/580713"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=580712"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=580712"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=580712"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}