Park homers but Royals rally to defeat Twins 4-3
KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Byung Ho Park has his first major league home run.
He'll have to keep waiting for his first big league victory.
Park's homer gave the Twins a lead in the eighth inning, but the Kansas City Royals came back with a two-run bottom of the eighth to get a 4-3 victory and give Minnesota its fourth straight loss to start the season.
This is only the fourth time since 1969 that the Twins have started 0-4.
Park homered on Joakim Soria's 1-1 pitch out to left-center for his first extra-base hit. Park led the Korean Baseball Organization with 53 homers last season before signing a three-year, $24 million contract with the Twins in December.
"First home run, it does mean something to me, but, the losing streak means more to me," Park said through an interpreter. "It's more of a concern. We need to get our first win."
Kevin Jepsen allowed an RBI triple to Salvador Perez in the eighth, and Perez then scored the winning run on Omar Infante's sacrifice fly.
"This is getting old," Jepsen (0-2) said.
The Royals have made a habit of rallying for victories while winning the last two American League titles.
"They grind the first inning to the ninth inning," Jepsen said. "It doesn't matter if they're down nine, up nine. They battle. They don't give at-bats away. Some teams, one way or another, they'll go up there and maybe try to hit home runs, but not this team."
The Twins went 1 for 12 with runners in scoring position, stranding 10 runners, and are hitting .209 for the season. They struck out seven times in the last three innings and 14 times in the game.
"We had some base-runners, another tough loss," Twins manager Paul Molitor said. "We put ourselves in position to win late. There were a lot of things that happened in that game. We haven't been doing things that are conducive to winning, in terms of leaving men on base and not putting the ball in play enough. We'll just turn the page and try to come back tomorrow."
Wade Davis worked around a 10-pitch walk to Brian Dozier to get his second save.
Twins right-hander Ervin Santana allowed two runs on six hits and two walks in six innings. He struck out seven.
"It's not going our way right now, but we'll just have to come tomorrow and erase what happened today and just play better tomorrow," Santana said.
Reymond Fuentes drove in two Royals in the second inning with a single for his first big league hit since Sept. 28, 2013 while with San Diego.
ROSARIO SITS
OF Eddie Rosario was not in the lineup after striking out six times in 12 at-bats in Baltimore. Molitor said Rosario has "been forcing it a little bit" but would start Saturday and hit second. Rosario did enter in the eighth as a defensive replacement and struck out to end the game.
TRAINER'S ROOM
Royals: OF Jarrod Dyson (pulled right oblique) will start a rehab assignment Saturday with Triple-A Omaha. Dyson was injured March 2 in the first spring training game. "It's time to get going and back into the flow of games," Dyson said. "I've spent enough time watching games and rehabbing. I think it's time to get started with my business." ... RHP Kyle Zimmer, the Royals' top pitching prospect, is beginning the season on the Omaha disabled list with a shoulder issue. Zimmer had shoulder surgery after the 2014 season.
UP NEXT
Twins: LHP Tommy Milone starts the middle game of the series. He went 2-0 with a 3.30 ERA in five starts last season against the Royals.
Royals: RHP Ian Kennedy makes his first start since the Royals signed him to a five-year, $70 million contract in January.
