Luke Keaschall's walk-off homer give Twins 5-3 victory over Royals in 11 innings

Bobby Nightengale, The Minnesota Star Tribune on Aug 10, 2025

Published in Baseball

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MINNEAPOLIS — Luke Keaschall has opened his career with an 11-game hitting streak and has reached base in all 12 games he has played.

How about a walk-off homer to add to the list?

Keaschall punched the air with his right arm and jumped in the air when he blasted a two-run, walk-off homer in the 11th inning Sunday to give the Twins a 5-3 victory over the Kansas City Royals at Target Field. It was Keaschall’s second career homer, and he was doused with buckets of waters once he crossed home plate.

The Twins have won four of their last five games, and they’ve taken back-to-back series against divisional opponents. They won their last two games in Detroit before taking two of three home games against Kansas City.

Reliever Michael Tonkin earned the win — emphasis on the word earned — after he pitched scoreless 10th and 11th innings with an automatic runner at second base. In both innings, he walked a batter before escaping the jams. After he struck out Salvador Perez to end the 11th inning, he shouted as he walked off the mound.

The top of the Royals lineup gave other relievers fits. Justin Topa allowed three straight batters to reach base in the ninth inning before leaving the bases loaded on a lineout. Cole Sands entered with two outs in the seventh inning, and he surrendered a single to Maikel Garcia and a go-ahead, two-run homer to Vinnie Pasquantino.

Sands has permitted 25 earned runs in 50 innings this season after he gave up 26 earned runs in 71 1/3 innings last year.

The Twins responded in the eighth inning. Austin Martin looped a fly-ball into left field, and Royals left fielder John Rave came up empty on his diving attempt. Martin was awarded a triple on the ball that rolled to the wall.

With two outs, Ryan Jeffers lined a first-pitch fastball off reliever Lucas Erceg into left field for a game-tying RBI single. The clutch hit extended Jeffers’ hitting streak to 12 games, and it ended the team’s 0 for 12 skid without a hit when there was a runner in scoring position.

Ryan Fitzgerald gave the Twins an early lead when his first major league hit landed above the right-field wall for a two-run homer. Fitzgerald celebrated with a bat flip when he saw the ball drop into the flowerpots before it bounced back onto the field.

Fitzgerald played 708 minor league games, which doesn’t include a season in an independent league, before he received his first major league start Sunday. Batting ninth in the Twins lineup, he was hitless in three career at-bats before he stepped to the plate in the third inning.

After Mickey Gasper drew a leadoff walk against Royals starter Ryan Bergert, Fitzgerald drilled a slider that caught the middle of the plate. Fitzgerald became the 15th player in Twins history to hit a homer for his first major league hit, and the first since catcher Caleb Hamilton did it in 2022. That was the only hit in Hamilton’s big-league career.

The Twins didn’t do much else against Bergert, a 25-year-old rookie right-hander who was acquired from San Diego at the trade deadline. Bergert struck out eight over 5 2/3 innings.

Twins starting pitcher José Ureña, called up following the trade deadline, did a lot of things pitchers are taught not to do. He threw 36 strikes and 37 pitches for balls, totaling four walks in three innings. He gave up a lot of hard contact.

The Royals refused to accept Ureña’s help, putting seven runners on base and scoring only one run. With runners on the corners and no outs in the first inning, Vinnie Pasquantino lined into an unassisted double play at first base, a replay review overturning a missed call from first-base umpire Phil Cuzzi that went against the Twins. Adam Frazier, two batters later, hit a two-out RBI single to right field.

Ureña walked the first two batters in the second inning. After a sacrifice bunt advanced both runners, Ureña escaped with a sharp lineout to second base when the infield was drawn in, and a strikeout.

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