Marlins put reeling Twins in deeper trouble in wild-card race with 4-1 win

MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — The cratering Minnesota Twins took another step backward in the American League wild-card race, as Jonah Bride homered to spark a four-run second inning off Bailey Ober for the 99-loss Miami Marlins in a 4-1 victory on Tuesday night.

Bride had three hits, while Nick Fortes and Xavier Edwards each had two and helped fuel the defining rally in the second against Ober (12-8), who failed to finish six innings for just the second time in his last 17 starts.

The Twins (81-76), who have lost 23 of their last 34 games and 14 of 20, dropped to two games below the postseason cut behind both Detroit and Kansas City. The Tigers and Royals occupy the last two of the three wild-card spots, tied at 83-74. The Twins hold the tiebreakers after winning the season series against both of them, but there are only five games to go.

The surging Tigers added a win to the column — their 28th in their last 39 games — even before the Twins took batting practice, with their game against Tampa Bay moved up to beat the rain.

The defending AL Central champion Twins were within two games of division-leading Cleveland in a tie for second place with Kansas City as late as Aug. 24, even after several bullpen collapses in the preceding week. But as they stumbled into the final month of the season their offense — which had been one of the most productive in baseball all summer — inconveniently went dark.

After trudging home from a 2-5 road trip, the Twins arrived at Target Field for their final homestand with two potential sources of a real spark. The opposing Marlins have the second-worst record in the major leagues, ahead of only the historically futile Chicago White Sox. Then there's the commanding and comforting presence of Ober, the 6-foot-9 right-hander who's had a breakout season and conveniently is scheduled to pitch again in the finale on Sunday.

Neither of those avenues panned out.

Bride hit a 104.3 mph rocket off a full-count fastball that reached the second deck beyond left field to put the Marlins, who lost 10 of their last 13 games entering this series, on the board. With two outs, Ober hit Derek Hill with a pitch and gave up an RBI single to Fortes two batters later.

Then Edwards drilled a two-run double to left field for a four-run lead that might well have been double that with the way the Twins have been playing. They went 1 for 9 with runners in scoring position, leaving 10 runners on base.

Royce Lewis had an RBI single in the third off Marlins starter Ryan Weathers (4-6), but the left-hander finished five innings for his first win since May 26. He was on the injured list for 2½ months.

Ober pitched to one batter in the sixth. He's 0-3 with five no-decisions in his last eight starts.

Twins catcher Ryan Jeffers threw out two runners trying to steal second base, including Edwards in the fourth. He has 30 stolen bases in 65 games and has only been caught four times.

Twins right fielder Max Kepler is not expected to return this week, having missed the last 20 games with an injury initially diagnosed as patellar tendinitis in his left knee that has since been broadened to include a hip problem that could require offseason surgery.

If Minnesota makes the playoffs, there's a possibility of him rejoining the active roster in October, but with his contract expiring this fall it's likely he has played his last game with an organization that signed him in 2009 as a 16-year-old out of Germany. Kepler's best season came in 2019, when he hit 36 home runs with 90 RBIs and an .855 on-base-plus-slugging percentage.

“I don’t think I could have done much more as a kid from Berlin,” he said.

RHP Edward Cabrera (4-8, 5.12 ERA) pitches for the Marlins in the middle game of the series on Wednesday night. RHP Simeon Woods Richardson (5-5, 4.00 ERA) starts for the Twins.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB

Minnesota Twins' Manuel Margot (13) reacts after hitting a pop out to first during the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Miami Marlins, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Miami Marlins starting pitcher Ryan Weathers (60) celebrates after the final out to end the bottom of the fifth inning of a baseball game against the Minnesota Twins, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Miami Marlins' Derek Hill celebrates after scoring off an RBI-single by Nick Fortes during the second inning of a baseball game against the Minnesota Twins, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Minnesota Twins starting pitcher Bailey Ober (17) delivers during the second inning of a baseball game against the Miami Marlins, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

Minnesota Twins starting pitcher Bailey Ober (17) reacts as pitching coach Pete Maki comes to the mound during the first inning of a baseball game against the Miami Marlins, Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2024, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Abbie Parr)

MEXICO CITY (AP) — California avocado growers are fuming this week about a U.S. decision to hand over pest inspections of Mexican orchards to the Mexican government.

Inspectors hired by the U.S. Department of Agriculture have been guarding against imports of avocados infected with insects and diseases since 1997, but they have also been threatened in Mexico for refusing to certify deceptive shipments in recent years.

Threats and violence against inspectors have caused the U.S. to suspend inspections in the past, and California growers question whether Mexico’s own inspectors would be better equipped to withstand such pressure.

"This action reverses the long-established inspection process designed to prevent invasions of known pests in Mexico that would devastate our industry," the California Avocado Commission wrote in an open letter to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack on Monday.

At present, inspectors work for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, known as APHIS. Because the United States also grows avocados, U.S. inspectors observe orchards and packing houses in Mexico to ensure exported avocados don’t carry pests that could hurt U.S. crops.

“It is well known that their physical presence greatly reduces the opportunity of others to game the system,” the avocado commission wrote. ”What assurances can APHIS provide us that its unilateral reversal of the process will be equal to or better than what has protected us?"

The letter added, "We are looking for specifics as to why you have concluded that substituting APHIS inspectors with Mexican government inspectors is in our best interest."

The decision was announced last week in a short statement by Mexico's Agriculture Department, which claimed that “with this agreement, the U.S. health safety agency is recognizing the commitment of Mexican growers, who in more than 27 years have not had any sanitary problems in exports.”

The idea that there have been no problems is far from the truth.

In 2022, inspections were halted after one of the U.S. inspectors was threatened in the western state of Michoacan, where growers are routinely subject to extortion by drug cartels. Only the states of Michoacan and Jalisco are certified to export avocados to the United States.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture said at the time that the inspector had received a threat “against him and his family.”

The inspector had “questioned the integrity of a certain shipment, and refused to certify it based on concrete issues,” according to the USDA statement. Some packers in Mexico buy avocados from other, non-certified states, and try to pass them off as being from Michoacan.

Sources at the time said the 2022 threat involved a grower demanding the inspector certify more avocados than his orchard was physically capable of producing, suggesting that at least some had been smuggled in from elsewhere.

And in June, two USDA employees were assaulted and temporarily held by assailants in Michoacan. That led the U.S. to suspend inspections in Mexico’s biggest avocado-producing state.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture did not immediately respond to questions about why the decision was made, or whether it was related to the threats.

Mexico currently supplies about 80% of U.S. imports of the fruit. Growers in the U.S. can't supply the country's whole demand, nor provide fruit year-round.

Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

FILE - A worker packs avocados at a plant in Uruapan, Michoacan state, Mexico, Feb. 9, 2024. (AP Photo/Armando Solis, File)