Mariners score seven unanswered runs to beat Twins

Published 10:05 am Wednesday, April 29, 2026

After a one-day reprieve from a deep losing stretch, the same issues that have hampered the Twins for the past two weeks resurfaced in a 7-1 loss to the Seattle Mariners on Tuesday night, April 28, at Target Field.

The Twins were hitless in 10 at-bats with a runner on second or third base, and the bullpen flopped after entering the seventh inning in a tie game. The Twins have lost 10 of their past 12 games, scoring fewer than three runs in five of their last seven.

With the Twins bullpen not getting any breathing room, Kody Funderburk surrendered a go-ahead RBI single to the Mariners’ Cole Young in the seventh inning and Cole Sands served up a three-run homer to Josh Naylor in the eighth.

The lack of offense spoiled a strong outing from Joe Ryan, who yielded six hits and two runs in six-plus innings.

“That was the story of the game,” Twins manager Derek Shelton said. “When you go 0-for-10 with runners in scoring position, and you’re not able to cash in on them, especially against a team like this where you know they are going to continue to go and you know they have the bullpen that they have.”

Ryan (2-3), coming off a rough start in which he gave up seven hits and seven runs (four earned) in five innings against the New York Mets, looked as if he were in complete control for much of the evening. He struck out six, throwing a first-pitch strike to 18 of his first 22 batters. He induced three foul outs to third base.

He received some quality help from his defense. Naylor was thrown out twice on the bases. Trevor Larnach made a running catch in the left-center gap in the sixth inning that prompted Ryan to raise both of his arms in excitement.

But Ryan’s solid start crumbled against his final three batters.

Julio Rodríguez hit a two-out double off Ryan in the sixth inning and scored the tying run when Naylor lined an RBI single to left field.

After Naylor was caught stealing for the second time (he was caught twice in 32 stolen-base attempts last year), Randy Arozarena opened the seventh inning with a leadoff double that knocked Ryan out of the game.

Funderburk, attempting to preserve a tie score, allowed a two-out RBI single to Young in a lefty-on-lefty matchup when a fastball was poked into left field.

In the eighth inning, Sands walked his first batter before giving up a double to Rodríguez. Naylor, the next batter, connected on a cutter at the top of the strike zone and sent it over the right-field wall for his fourth homer of the season. Naylor admired his swing for a moment, then flipped his bat as he stepped into his home run trot.

“You can’t leave the balls in the middle of the plate to Naylor, Rodriguez and that group because of the fact if you do, they’re going to get hit hard, and that’s what happened tonight,” Shelton said.

The Twins were hitless in nine at-bats with a runner in scoring position against Gilbert. The Mariners’ starting pitcher tiptoed around a pair of one-out singles in the third inning, inducing a flyout against Larnach and a groundout versus Austin Martin.

The bases were loaded with one out in the fourth inning through Josh Bell’s leadoff single, an error and a walk. Gilbert escaped when he struck out Tristan Gray and induced a first-pitch groundout against Royce Lewis, who was batting ninth in the Twins lineup for just the second time since his rookie season in 2022.

In the fifth, Larnach bashed a double off the top of the tall wall in right-center field, and Gilbert retired three of the next four batters without Larnach even reaching third base.

The Twins had only one baserunner after the Mariners tied the score in the sixth inning.

Rodríguez, who produced three doubles over the final four innings, hit a two-run double to left field off new Twins reliever Luis García in the ninth inning.