Twins walk off Royals again, win 5-4 on Brooks Lee’s RBI single in bottom of ninth

The 13-game winning streak may be over, but the Twins have found a way to make victory even more thrilling.

Brooks Lee grounded a single up the middle in the bottom of the ninth Saturday, driving home Carlos Correa with the game-winning run — and completing the Twins’ third walk-off victory in four days — to beat the Royals 5-4 at Target Field.

The Twins have now won 16 of their past 18 games, and 17 of their past 20 home games, which is fun. Mobbing a teammate as the opposition trudges to the dugout is even better.

“Huge moment. I mean, that’s just beautiful,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “Walk-offs, you know we’ve had two in a row here, but they don’t happen that often. And you remember every one of them. They’re very special to the players — you win the game for your team out there, it feels really good.”

Sure did for Lee, 4-for-30 in his past eight games before Saturday. Pinch-hitters Correa and Ryan Jeffers drew ninth-inning walks, setting up Lee to deliver a two-out hit off former Twins pitching prospect Steven Cruz.

“Just trying to make sure that I got my pitch. I tried to get something out over the plate, stick with my approach and hope good things happen,” Lee said.

They did. He got ahead 3-1, fouled off a fastball but didn’t miss the next one, 98.5 mph from Cruz.

Or did he? “I mis-hit that ball, yeah,” Lee said. “But with a good approach and a good swing, it took care of itself.”

A lot of things are taking care of themselves for the Twins these days. Harrison Bader and Kody Clemens homered, for example, and Ty France drove in two runs with a two-out single, just the latest contributions from the Twins’ not-quite-castoffs. The three, each of whom was acquired for a bargain price with low expectations, have combined to drive in 60 runs over the season’s first 51 games. Clemens’ ninth-inning double beat the Guardians on Wednesday, and France’s ninth-inning homer did in the Royals on Friday.

“We have a lot of confidence. If you don’t have confidence in yourself, you’ll get buried,” said Clemens, whose four home runs in a month include two that have given the Twins a lead and Saturday’s, which tied the game. “I’m not up there thinking I’m going to get one, but I know if I can put a good swing on it, the ball will carry.”

Even if it doesn’t look like it.

“That was like a 9-iron that he got under, but he also struck it really cleanly. [I’m] like, ‘Man, at that angle, is it going to go?’ ” Baldelli said of Clemens’ home run. “It didn’t just go, it went out by a long ways.”

Those runs came off Royals starter Michael Wacha, the veteran righthander who hadn’t allowed so much offense in his past eight starts. It didn’t appear he would Saturday, either, as he didn’t allow a Twin to reach second base in the first four innings while the Royals built him a 4-0 lead.

But Bader broke that spell with a blast into the left field seats to lead off the fifth inning. Wacha then hit Willi Castro with a pitch and gave up a one-out single to Christian Vázquez. With two out, France got behind 0-2 but eventually lined an opposite-field single down the right field line, scoring both runners and giving France the Twins’ RBI lead this season with 28.

“I couldn’t be more pleased with where I’m sitting right now and the way our guys responded in that game because those are games that become unwinnable, but we didn’t let it get to that point,” Baldelli said. “We fought real good and got the job done. The guys are getting the job done, all of them right now.”

Zebby Matthews started for the Twins, and struck out a career-high nine batters in four innings. It set a tone because the bullpen struck out another nine Royals, including Bobby Witt Jr. four times. But Matthews’ outing included one rough trip through the Royals’ lineup. A walk and three singles, the last of them a bases-loaded, two-run looping line drive into right field by Maikel Garcia, gave Kansas City an early lead.

Justin Topa relieved Matthews in the fifth and doubled the Royals’ lead with a walk, an RBI double by Vinnie Pasquantino and a single by Salvador Perez. But the Twins’ bullpen kept the Royals off the scoreboard for the rest of the game.