Joe Ryan Silences the Yankees, Twins Take the Series 6-1

Twins 6, Yankees 1, and by the fifth inning you could've left Yankee Stadium and not missed a single thing that mattered.

Joe Ryan made sure of that. Seven innings, three hits, nine strikeouts, zero runs -- the kind of start that turns a getaway-day matinee into a formality. The Yankees managed exactly one run all afternoon, and it came in the bottom of the 9th off relievers, with the outcome long since filed away. This is the Twins' series win at Yankee Stadium, and it's the Yankees' ninth loss in their last ten games. Nine of ten. Say it a few times, it doesn't get better.

The Turning Point

Ryan Weathers actually kept it manageable into the fourth, down just 2-0 on a first-inning Josh Bell single and a fourth-inning Brooks Lee knock. Two runs against a lineup that's supposed to hit is survivable.

Then came the fifth. Bases loaded, two outs, Royce Lewis at the plate against Paul Blackburn -- and Lewis rolled a single up the middle that scored two, pushing it to 4-0. That's the at-bat that ended the afternoon as a competitive game. Everything after was mop-up.

The Twins weren't done piling on. In the sixth, Austin Martin walked with the bases loaded to make it 5-0, and Kody Clemens added a sac fly for good measure. Anthony Volpe -- yeah, the Captain -- misplayed a chopper off the bat of Ryan Kreidler in that same inning, and the Twins made the Yankees pay for it.

That's twice now this series the defense has handed away an extra out or two, and against a team like this, extra outs turn into extra runs fast. It's a small thing in a 6-1 loss. It's not a small thing over a losing streak.

Star of the Game

Ryan. Not particularly close.

Seven shutout innings on three hits with nine strikeouts is an ace's turn against anybody, but doing it to a lineup that's been starving for offense for two weeks makes it look even more lopsided. He walked one batter. He didn't allow a run. He was in complete control from the first pitch to the last out he recorded.

(Somewhere in the visitors' clubhouse, Ryan's probably wondering why teams keep pitching around him instead of just letting him beat you -- either way works out fine for Minnesota.)

Key At-Bats and Pitching Lines

Weathers took the loss: 4 innings, 6 hits, 4 earned runs. Not disastrous, but not enough against a team that had won the first game and clearly wasn't going to let this series slip away twice. Blackburn came in and immediately walked into the Lewis at-bat that broke the game open -- one inning, one hit allowed, and it was the hit that mattered most.

Camilo Doval gave up two more in relief, because at this point the bullpen had decided misery loves company.

The lone bright spot, if you're squinting: Trent Grisham scored the Yankees' only run in the ninth, coming around on a Jasson Dominguez inning-ending double play grounder. A run's a run. It also ended the game, so read into that what you will.

Worth a mention -- Twins center fielder Byron Buxton left after the first inning, re-aggravating a hip injury on a caught-stealing at second (his first time caught stealing since May of 2024, of all the times to pick). Rookie Kyler Fedko replaced him and the Twins didn't miss a beat, which tells you something about the state of things right now.

No home runs in this one, from either side. Just a start that got out of hand early and a lineup that couldn't do anything about it.

The Yankees won the opener 5-2 on Friday, then dropped the next two by a combined score of 17-5. That's how a series slips away -- not one bad game, but two in a row where the other team's lineup keeps hitting and yours doesn't. It's just the Twins' second series win at the Stadium going back to 2019, which tells you how unusual this stretch has been.

The Yankees are 49-40, four and a half back of Tampa Bay, and they'll need to find some answers fast -- because 1-9 over any ten-game stretch isn't a slump anymore, it's a pattern.