AL Wild-Card Race: Twins' Swoon Continues: 'Our Margin of Error Keeps Shrinking'

Minnesota's playoff hopes suffered another blow

Would lose to Rays and Yankees in tiebreaker

The Minnesota Twins' once-promising playoff hopes dimmed further on Tuesday as they lost their fourth straight game and fell below .500 for the first time since April 19.

The Twins fell 9-2 to the Los Angeles Angels in a game that saw them squander a 2-0 lead and never truly threaten after the Angels tied the game in the fourth inning.

The loss dropped the Twins to 74-75, 4 1/2 games behind the Tampa Bay Rays and New York Yankees for the final two wild-card spots in the American League.

The Rays and Yankees both won Tuesday night, so the Twins would lose a potential tiebreaker with either team.

The Twins have now lost eight of their last 10 games and are 5-15 since Aug. 30.

They have been outscored by a combined 83-32 during that stretch.

"Our margin of error keeps shrinking," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said.

"We're just not playing good baseball right now, and we're not getting it done.

"We're not hitting, we're not pitching, we're not playing good defense."

The Twins have six games remaining in the regular season, including three against the Rays and three against the White Sox.

They will need to win at least five of those games to have any chance of making the playoffs.

"We're not going to give up," Baldelli said.

"We're going to keep fighting until the end.

"But we know we need to play better than we have been."