ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Minnesota Twins manager Paul Molitor will be happy not to have to play Evan Longoria again this season after Sundays series finale.Hes had a pretty good season against us, Molitor said after Longoria hit his 24th home run of the season as part of the Tampa Bay Rays 7-3 win over the Twins on Saturday night. I dont know what his totals are, but every time we get him out, Im relieved.In six games against the Twins, Longoria has six home runs this year. That matches the most of any major-league player this year against Minnesota. Clevelands Mike Napoli also has six, but in 13 games. Longoria has 14 career home runs against the Twins, his most against any non-division opponent.Hes made us pay, Molitor said. All six games, I think hes been a contributing factor.The Rays hit three more solo home runs in Saturdays win -- theyre on pace for a team-record 211 home runs this season, though manager Kevin Cash was also happy to see some small-ball scoring with multiple stolen bases and aggressive baserunning on wild pitches.Love the home runs, Cash said. But the way we have found some ways to manufacture some runs here of late has been really nice. We struggled with doing that for a lot of the season.The Rays are 6-3 on their homestand, which secures their first winning homestand of the season. The Arizona Diamondbacks are now the only team that has gone all season without at least one series win.The Rays will send Matt Andriese, literally stretching himself back out to be a starter after an extended stint in the Tampa Bay bullpen, to mound Sunday. His first start Tuesday saw him throw 58 pitches in four effective innings, and he should be able to work longer this time around.Andriese (6-2, 2.72) beat the Twins on June 4, despite giving up eight hits and three runs (two earned) in five innings. Last year, he struggled in relief against Minnesota, giving up five runs in three innings. Hell remember Twins leadoff hitter Brian Dozier, whos 3-for-5 against him with a home run and four RBI.Thats still better than Minnesotas Sunday starter, fellow right-hander Kyle Gibson, who is 0-4 for his career against the Rays with an 8.85 ERA, having allowed 20 earned runs in 20 1/3 innings. This season, Gibson is 3-6 with a 4.94 ERA, but hell need to be careful with Tampa Bays 3-4 hitters -- Longoria has a .400 career average against him and Brad Miller is at .455.The two teams, with nearly identical records at the bottom of the American League standings, go in opposite directions after Sundays game. Tampa Bay hits the road for a six-game swing in Toronto and New York, and the Twins return home for seven games against the Houston Astros and Kansas City Royals. Jae Crowder Jersey . Their experience showed Tuesday as the No. 10 Badgers blunted a Saint Louis surge to win 63-57 and advance to face West Virginia in Wednesdays finals of the Cancun Challenge. John Stockton Jersey . -- Al Jefferson found a groove just in time for the Charlotte Bobcats. http://www.officialjazzauthenticstore.com/kids-dante-exum-jazz-jersey/ . Nine days before the opening ceremony, organizing committee chief Dmitry Chernyshenko said Wednesday that Sochi is "fully ready" and will deliver safe, friendly and well-run games that defy the grim reports that have overshadowed preparations. Jeff Hornacek Jersey .J. -- Seven games into a disappointing season, New York Giants defensive catalyst Jason Pierre-Paul is getting the feeling hes back. Adrian Dantley Jersey . -- The goal posts lying flat on the field, Arizonas fans lingered on the field, congregating around the locker room entrance nearly 30 minutes after rushing out of the stands. RIO DE JANEIRO -- It began in a rain-drenched 5,000-seat stadium on an island between Manhattan and Queens. Some Jamaican kid with the improbably awesome name of Bolt was in the Big Apple, not so much to announce his presence to the world, but to figure out who he was.We clambered into a van and headed over to Icahn Stadium. The headliner that night: American sprinter Tyson Gay.Or so we thought.Wearing a white top and black shoes -- nothing flashy -- Usain Bolt took off out of lane 4 for the mens 100 meters. He busted through the blue tape in 9.72 seconds. That was the new world record.The Beijing Olympics were still two months away, and Bolt was still wondering which race he would add to his specialty, the 200 meters. His coach had urged him to do the 400. At 6-foot-5, the thought went, Bolt was simply too awkward to burst from the starting blocks and build enough speed to win the shortest sprint.Everybody thought wrong.I wasnt really looking for a world record, Bolt said that night, but it was there for the taking.He took it again in Beijing. Then took it in the 200. Then again in the 4x100 relay. He closed out his Olympic career in style Friday night, making it 9 for 9 in the Olympic sprints.I watched that first race in New York, along with all 325 seconds he spent sprinting in the cumulative 23 races hes run at the Olympics -- in Beijing, London and, now, Rio de Janeiro.I watched track and field become fun again.Even at its best, the sprint game had always been a motley collection of unsmiling, sneering faces with loads of trouble seemingly lingering around every curve.Bolt wadded up that stereotype. Yes, sprinting is serious and very difficult work, he showed us. But this stuff can also be eminently watchable. Not just the reggae-filled, selfie-taking, To-The-World-posing after-parties, which Bolt has turned into performance art.The races themselves, too.Time after time, I saw him burst out of those blocks in the 100 and wondered, hows he going to pull this off? Most of the time, he had been losing at the halfway point. By the end, he was almost always far in front.I couldnt believe what I was seeing in Beijing, sitting 10 rows up from the finish line, when he hotdogged down the final eight steps of his 100, casting his arms to his side, then thumping his chest, then breaking his own world record nonetheless.Jacques Rogge, the president of the International Olympic Committee at the time, had the temerity to criticize Bolts joy, saying thats not the way we perceive a champion.As tone deaf and clueless as it sounded then, it makes even less sense today.Bolt has saved his sport and, in turn, kept the Olympics relevant -- not such a small deal in the wake of whats happened at these games, with their constant alerts about violence, disorganization and Ryan Lochte.Without Bolt, the final week of the last three Olympics would have been an endless loop of beach volleyball and hoops and wishing Michael Phelps or Americas latest gold-medal gymnast competed in those events, too. Track, supposedly the glue that brings the whole thing together, wwould be nothing more than a collection of pole vaulters, distance runners and others whos every accomplishment immediately falls under the lens of the ever-present doping microscope: Is anything you see in this stadium really to be believed?Yes, we should, and have, asked those questions of Bolt, too.dddddddddddd Jamaicas anti-doping program is flawed. Who knows whats really going on there?But Bolt has insisted he is clean. He has done it in a serious tone. He has also insisted, at different times, that yams, Chicken McNuggets, his Aunt Lillys jerk pork and, yes, the nutrients from his pints of Guinness have powered him to the top.He has come close, a few times, to being knocked off, and Ive seen Bolt at his most vulnerable.Last year, back in Beijing for the world championships, he was injured and nowhere near his best.Justin Gatlin should have beaten him in the 100 but started leaning into the finish line too soon and Bolt persevered by one-hundredth of one second. In doing so, Bolt checked the box that anyone seeking to be called The Greatest must check at least once: Gritting one out when youre not at your best.Feeling he was the faster man, Gatlin said he had something in store for Bolt in the 200, a few nights later.You dont talk about my 200 meters like that, Bolt said. It was the most-telling sentence Ive ever heard him speak.He spanked Gatlin -- powering his long legs through a curve that was built for him, then going into hyperdrive down the straightway in a race he calls his baby. Bolt got upended by a Segway during the celebration. He popped right up. He delivers great theatre even when he doesnt mean to.In 2012, I saw him in Kingston, dealing with leg injuries and the remnants of an out-of-form preseason at Jamaicas version of Olympic trials.Yohan Blake beat him not once, but twice, that week.This, ladies and gentlemen, is the man to beat at the London Olympics, I wrote after the second win, speaking of Blake.Those are 13 words I wish I could have back.In Rio, as Friday night morphed into Saturday morning, I was in the press tribune, putting a bow on what Bolt insists will be his last run at the Olympics.From the darkened field below, the shouts of Usain Bolt, Usain Bolt started ringing out.I squinted, saw a tall man in yellow shirt and shorts hoisting a javelin, with a few dozen workers and cameramen surrounding him.The man took a few long steps, reared back and let the javelin fly. It pierced the grass, not all that far downfield, but a pretty nice throw nonetheless.Could that really have been The Worlds Fastest Man -- all wrung out, out of words, too tired to entertain anymore -- throwing the javelin down there at 2 in the morning for fun?It was.I couldnt take my eyes off him. Then again, who ever could?---National Writer Eddie Pells has covered more than 30 of Bolts races at Olympics and world championships, starting with his first world record in 2008 and ending Friday night in Rio de Janeiro. Cheap Jerseys China NFL Jerseys China NFL Jerseys Wholesale Discount Basketball Jerseys Cheap NHL Jerseys Authentic Cheap Baseball Jerseys Free Shipping Cheapest College Jerseys Sale Cheap Football Jerseys China Nike NFL Jerseys Canada Wholesale NHL Jerseys From China MLB Jerseys Outlet Canada Wholesale NBA Jerseys Canada Store Cheap Soccer Jerseys China Cheap Authentic Jerseys Canada ' ' '