MINNEAPOLIS -- All Alex Verdugo could do was stare at his glove and sulk. 

After his fifth-inning error enabled Carlos Correa to reach base and eventually led to Nick Gordon’s go-ahead grand slam in a 10-5 loss to the Twins on Tuesday night at Target Field, who could blame him. 

It’s a feeling and portrait that’s become all too common in the last month as the Red Sox, losers in seven of their past nine, have fallen from playoff contention to the American League East basement. Tuesday’s loss was the latest result that’s been influenced by a string of unforced mistakes that have led to Boston’s own undoing. 

“We’ve got to clean up everything,” said Verdugo, who went 2-for-4 with an RBI double and scored a pair of runs.

The Red Sox’s fifth inning was emblematic of that.

Rookie right-hander Kutter Crawford struggled early in his start, but had settled down by the fifth. He got Luis Arraez to fly out to begin the inning then forced Correa to fly out to the gap. Verdugo came running in to make the play, but, by his own admission, took his eye off the ball and it bounced off his glove.

“It’s not something I take lightly and when we’re in a skid like this, those are the little things that separate a team from winning and losing,” Verdugo said.

And it did.

What could’ve been a two-out, nobody on situation suddenly spiraled. A walk to Max Kepler followed and ended Crawford’s night. In relief, Ryan Brasier hit Jose Miranda with the first pitch he threw, then yielded Gordon’s towering slam, which traveled a Statcast-projected 416 feet over the right-field wall.

“Error, walk, hit by pitch and then 0-2 grand slam. It’s one of those, we’ve been fighting in those innings,” manager Alex Cora said. “This is where we’re at. We know we are better than this, but we haven’t proven it over 100-plus games.”

Boston’s playoff chances stood at 33.3 percent, per FanGraphs, after it opened the month of August with a pair of wins. Now, after a 10-18 stretch has dropped the Sox to nine games back in the AL Wild Card race, their playoff probability is under one percent.

What made it particularly frustrating for Cora is what happened the night before. Just 24 hours earlier, the manager lambasted the same mental mistakes. 

“We’re better than this, we’re much better. It’s OK to lose games. But the way sometimes we lose games, it’s not acceptable,” he said following Monday’s 4-2 loss in the series opener.

In that game, walks and sloppy baserunning cost the Red Sox. Verdugo failed to tag up from third on a diving catch by Max Kepler in the third inning that would’ve extended Boston’s lead to two. Two innings later, starter Brayan Bello walked two batters to start the fifth before being removed and relievers Matt Strahm and John Schreiber couldn’t get out of the inning, surrendering another walk and later Gio Urshela’s go-ahead bases-clearing double.

Swap out Verdugo’s baserunning error for his fielding mishap and it looked a lot like Tuesday’s game.

Like Bello, Crawford’s command disappeared in stretches and the Twins took advantage of those opportunities. After getting the first two outs of the first inning, Crawford walked the following two batters. Then Gordon, foreshadowing his final blow later in the game, made Crawford pay, shooting a ball through the left-field gap for a two-out, two-run double.

“Fell behind too many guys, walked too many people. And it’s hard to pitch when you’re giving up that many free passes,” said Crawford, who has allowed 24 runs in his last 23 2/3 innings.

It’s made the Red Sox’s recent descent particularly debilitating, with the team seemingly beating itself. And after the loss, Boston’s clubhouse seemed to recognize it. A somber and frustrated locker room, sick of new potholes popping up quicker than they can patch them.

“We've got to obviously clean up the defense. Pitchers have to attack the zone; we've got to come through clutch with hitting,” Verdugo said. “We can't just get a couple of hits and call it good ... Right now, we're not firing on any of the cylinders."