Brewers rookie Jacob Misiorowski made a meal of the Twins on Friday night, taking a no-hitter into the seventh inning in just his second major league start.
It was an impressive performance for the 6-foot-7, 23-year-old right-hander from Grain Valley, Mo., and pleased at least half of the announced crowd of 28,011 at Target Field. But after a 17-6 loss that was somehow worse than that might indicate, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli wasn’t thinking so much about Misiorowski’s performance.
“Their young pitcher threw the ball very well. That’s definitely the case,” Baldelli said. “But it’s certainly not where my mind is at right now. Obviously, we’ve got to just, overall, play better baseball.”
Christian Yelich hit two bases-clearing doubles and finished with a career-high eight RBIs, tying the franchise mark set by Rowdy Tellez against Cincinnati in 2019, and Jackson Chourio and Joey Ortiz each drove in three as the Brewers dropped the Twins to 3-10 since June 5.
They fell back to a game under .500 and into a tie for fourth place with Kansas City in the American League Central.
Minnesota Twins starting pitcher Joe Ryan throws to the Milwaukee Brewers in the first inning of a baseball game Friday, June 20, 2025, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Bruce Kluckhohn)
Throwing a four-seam fastball that routinely tipped at just under 102 mph, and a slider that averaged better than 94 mph, Misiorowski didn’t allow a base-runner until Byron Buxton walked to start the seventh, and didn’t give up a hit until Matt Wallner followed with a home run into the porch in right field.
That cut the Brewers’ lead to 12-2.
“We’ve got to come together as a team right now and collectively step up. Myself included, the coaching staff, all the players,” Baldelli said. “As a team, we have to do better than what we’re doing right now.”
Wallner’s homer ended the night for Misiorowksi (2-0), who left to a standing ovation from Brewers fans, and maybe a few Twins fans. In his first start, Misiorowski threw five hitless innings in a victory over St. Louis, fanning five and walking four.
“We’ve all seen pitches pretty good,” said Willi Castro, 0 for 3 against Misiorowski but one of the few Twins to make good contact against him — on a line drive to third baseman Caleb Durbin that left his bat at 102.3 mph in the second inning.
“I think we had some really good swings against them,” Castro added. “He obviously did a really good job today. … You don’t see a guy throwing a slider 95, 96 (mph). It’s really hard to pick up.”
Ryan (7-3) was charged with three earned runs on three hits and three walks in 5⅓ innings. He struck out seven and threw 101 pitches.
“Misiorowski, he was great,” Ryan said. “I’ve actually seen some videos of him in the minors, and he’s got some of the best stuff in the big leagues. He’s pretty electric. So, obviously I knew it was going to be a tough day for the offense on that side. But, yeah, he threw the ball really well. A lot of quick innings. I didn’t do the same.”
The Brewers broke open the game with a five-run seventh inning. Four consecutive singles and a walk off reliever Justin Topa made it 5-0 and spurred Baldelli to replace Topa with left-hander Joey Wentz to face lefty Yelich.
Yelich’s double down the third-base line made it 8-0.
Rhys Hoskins’ liner to left to start the fifth was the game’s first hit. He was later doubled up by first baseman Kody Clemens, who snagged a hard liner from Collins and, falling to his knees, touched the bag with his glove.
Leadoff hitter Sal Frelick started the sixth with a liner to right field and scored on Jackson Chourio’s double to right-center, which Wallner stopped from going to the wall but not in time to stop Frelick from making it 2-0.
Ryan was pulled for left-hander Danny Coulombe and Chourio, who took third on Byron Buxton’s throw home trying to get Frelick, scored on a single past a drawn-in infield by Yelich to make it 3-0.
In the eighth inning, Yelich sent a line drive off the corner of the scoreboard in left-center of Wentz to make it 12-2.
Coulombe (2), Topa (4) and Wentz (5) combined to allow 11 runs in 2⅔ innings before closer Jhoan Duran was called on to clean up with two out in the eighth. Infielder Jonah Bride pitched the ninth — his fourth pitching appearance in June — and allowed five runs on four hits, including Yelich’s RBI grounder.
But the damage had been done long before that. Again. Since a 14-3 loss to the A’s on June 5 in Sacramento, the Twins have allowed at least 10 runs five times, and at least 14 runs four times.
“I don’t want our position players pitching. We do it when we have to do it. When we’re forced to do it,” Baldelli said, adding that Bride has been a trouper for the team in these blowout losses. But, he added, “That’s obviously not the sign you’re looking for, when your position players are being entered into the game (to pitch). You want to avoid that at all costs. We can’t allow ourselves to be put in that type of spot.”
Originally Published: June 20, 2025 at 10:20 PM CDT