MILWAUKEE — Ryan Jeffers couldn’t have had a much better spring at the plate. But his exhibition game success didn’t translate into early-season results, and by the time the catcher stepped to the plate in the seventh inning on Wednesday, he was hitless in his first 13 at-bats of the season.

One big swing changed all that — and flipped the Twins’ fortunes on Wednesday, as well.

Jeffers hit a three-run homer, which highlighted five-run seventh inning for the Twins, who finally broke through with runners in scoring position, on their way to a 7-3 win over the Milwaukee Brewers on Wednesday afternoon in the series finale at American Family Field.

After taking two balls to begin his at-bat and then fouling off four straight pitches, Jeffers got ahold of a high fastball and deposited it behind the left-field wall, pumping his fist as he rounded first base. He added an insurance run in the ninth inning with an RBI single.

Jeffers’ big swing, which was the Twins’ first home run since Royce Lewis hit a blast in the first inning of the Twins’ first game of the season last Thursday, capped a rally started by Alex Kirilloff earlier in the inning.

Kirilloff, who finished the day 4-for-4 with two singles, a double, a triple and a walk, led off the inning with the double. Byron Buxton followed with a double of his own and then raced home to score on Carlos Correa’s game-tying hit.

The big inning gave the Twins their first lead of the day after falling behind early in the game.

Wednesday marked the first start in nearly 700 days for Twins pitcher Chris Paddack, who had Tommy John surgery in May 2022 — and it didn’t quite start how he would have wanted it to.

The Brewers loaded the bases in the first inning, and while the starter got the inning-ending double play that he was looking for to emerge unscathed, it took him 20 pitches to get out of the inning.

Paddack ran into more trouble an inning later, giving up a run in the second. He allowed a home run to Rhys Hoskins later in his outing, before exiting after four innings in his first start back.

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