Alex Kirilloff fouled a pitch down the right-field line for strike two during his fourth-inning at-bat. He took a few steps up the baseline before watching it hook foul, and turned around to continue his at-bat.

He never got the chance. As Kirilloff dug in, umpire Scott Berry called a pitch-clock violation because the hitter wasn't ready with eight seconds remaining on the clock, and ruled it an automatic strike three.

"The pitch clock was not friendly to us in this series, obviously," Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said, referring to righthander Sonny Gray's automatic ball that contributed to a bases-loaded walk Saturday. "I spoke to the umpires about it. It seemed like it was [starting] fast, so they said they would keep an eye on it."

Gray's violations came during the inning when he gave up three runs in Saturday's 4-3 loss to Cleveland; Kirilloff's strikeout was the only time he was retired in four plate appearances during Minnesota's 2-0 loss on Sunday. He had two walks and the team's only hit in his other plate appearances.

Kirilloff agreed with his manager that the clock seemed to start earlier than it should have.

"I should have been more aware and looked up," Kirilloff said. "Something has to get figured out with long foul balls if the [batter] runs out of the box. I thought about calling timeout, but I felt comfortable, like I was ready to go, and just didn't look up in time."