MLB Scores: Twins 6, Marlins 4

The Marlins gave up a late lead and lost 6-4 in 11 innings Tuesday night.

Adam Conley went six and two thirds innings, with eight strikeouts and only one walk. But the three earned runs he surrendered in the no decision came mostly off the bat of Eduardo Nunez.

Leading off the bottom of the first, Nunez pulled a fastball into the third deck at Target Field. Robbie Grossman would score on a wild pitch later in the inning to give the Twins an early 2-1 lead.

But the Marlins would battle back in the middle innings to regain the lead. Adeiny Hechavarria was brought home by an Ichiro groundout in the third after he lead off the inning with a triple. Derek Dietrich singled home Marcell Ozuna in the fourth, and Christian Yelich brought in Martin Prado’s leadoff double with a single of his own in the fifth to give the Fish a 4-2 lead.

Twins rookie Pat Dean was pulled in the fifth after giving up four earned runs on seven hits in his shortest start of his young career.

In the bottom of the fifth, Nunez took Conley deep again, just past Ozuna’s Spiderman effort on the centre field fence for his ninth home run on the year. Nunez came close to a three home run game when he flied out to the opposite field warning track in the eighth, and he’s now hitting a career-best .337 average this season, and his 8.3 offensive WAR has perhaps been overlooked playing for the lowly Twins.

There wasn’t any more scoring in the quick-moving game until the bottom of the eighth, when a Grossman solo homer off of David Phelps tied up the ballgame. The shot was the first home run that Phelps has given up this season.

The Marlins had a chance to take the lead in the top of 10, when an Ichiro single and stolen base put a runner in scoring position with two outs for Giancarlo Stanton. But Stanton went down swinging to Minnesota reliever Fernando Abad. Stanton went hitless yet again as his slump continues, but he did have an RBI groundout and some hard-hit outs early on; perhaps a sign that the end of his struggles are near.

After two clean innings from Kyle Barraclough, Dustin McGowan came in to pitch in the bottom of the 11^th against the heart of the Twins order. McGown (0-2) walked both Grossman and Joe Mauer to start the inning. Grossman would later get caught stealing, but it didn’t matter as Brian Dozier pulled one over the left field fence for the walk-off.

Ichiro recorded batted lead off and recorded hits 2,967 and 2,968 with two singles on the evening.

Buddy Boshers (1-0) was the seventh reliever used by the Twins Tuesday, and pitched two thirds of an inning to record the win.

Miami will look to redeem themselves tomorrow night as Wei-Yin Chen (3-2) faces off against former Marlin Ricky Nolasco (2-4).

Source: FanGraphs

Hero of the Game: Robbie Grossman (.372 WPA)

Goat of the Game: Dustin McGowan (-.365)

Play of the Game: Brian Dozier walk-off home run bottom 11th (.393)