BOSTON -- Looking to stay alive in the postseason chase, the Twins hoped to right the ship this weekend against the Red Sox with a strong finish to what's been a shaky 11-game road trip.

But in 8-5 defeat to Boston filled with debacle, Minnesota appeared even more adrift at sea with its playoff hopes sinking fast. The Twins sprung all sorts of leaks, and lost their emotional rudder in the process.

"Believe it or not, I thought we were going to do something special tonight," said reliever J.C. Romero, who gave up an eighth-inning grand slam to John Olerud.

The gloom started when team leader Torii Hunter went down with a strained tendon in his left ankle after trying to make a leaping catch at the wall in center field. Hunter was later placed on the 15-day disabled list.

The doom didn't follow until after four brisk and scoreless innings from pitchers Carlos Silva and Bronson Arroyo.

Silva gave up back-to-back two-out singles before Boston's Johnny Damon lined a single into right field that launched what became a comedy of errors.

Bill Mueller scored on the hit as right fielder Jacque Jones scooped up the ball and made a low throw to second that went past first baseman Justin Morneau. Then the ball rolled through catcher Joe Mauer at the plate for an error, which allowed Tony Graffanino to score and sent Damon to third.

Then the baseball became a pinball.

Backing up the plate, Silva's throw to Mauer was off target and skipped to Morneau, who fired to Luis Rodriguez at third as Damon rounded past the bag. As Damon bolted for home, Rodriguez's throw to the plate hit him in the helmet for another error as the third run scored.

On this one, blame could be shared like the clubhouse postgame meal spread.

"Morneau should have cut it. Joe should have caught it. Silva should have ate it, and then Rodriguez shouldn't have hit the guy in the head," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire summed up. "So we had a lot of ways to get people out there."

It's not a play often seen from the usually fundamentally sound Minnesota defense.

"If it's going to happen to anybody, it's going to happen to us the way things are going right now," said Jones, who hit a ninth-inning home run.

Silva (7-5) allowed two earned runs on seven hits in seven innings. Without getting run support lately, he is 0-2 in his last four starts with just a 2.10 ERA. But the Twins offense responded and finally scored on Arroyo with Mauer's seventh-inning home run to right field.

After Mueller homered off Silva in the bottom of the seventh, Terry Tiffee added an RBI triple and scored on a groundout in the Minnesota eighth.

Another defensive breakdown ruined the Twins in the bottom of the eighth. With Jesse Crain on the mound, late replacement Juan Castro missed Edgar Renteria's grounder to third base for an error. Crain followed that by walking David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez to load the bases.

"You kind of put yourself in an ugly situation with the bases loaded," Gardenhire said.

Romero entered and watched Olerud smack his 2-1 pitch into the right-field bullpen.

"What can you do?" Romero said. "Keep your head up and be ready to play tomorrow."

The sun may come up Saturday, but the Twins have their work cut out to stave off darker days without Hunter. They have dropped six of nine games, including four of the last five, on the current 11-game road trip.

With Sunday's trading deadline approaching fast, the Twins were already seeking to add another bat. With Hunter and his team-leading 14 homers on the DL, they might need one more than ever.

"Other teams have seen (Hunter's injury)," Jones said. "The price is going to go up, you know? We'll see what happens."