Minnesota Twins at Cleveland Guardians: Final Score & Recap
Line Score
| Team | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MIN | 1 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 10 | 11 | 0 |
| CLE | 1 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 13 | 3 |
The Story
The Minnesota Twins handed the Cleveland Guardians a 10-6 defeat at Progressive Field on July 22, 2026, overcoming a pre-game environment in which the DiamondIQ model's estimate gave Cleveland a 58 percent chance of winning at home. Minnesota scored in six of nine innings, finishing with 11 hits and no errors against Cleveland's 13 hits and three costly errors, and the Guardians never recovered from the damage inflicted early against their starter Slade Cecconi.
The game turned decisively in the third and fourth innings, where Minnesota did the bulk of its damage against Cecconi. In the third, a Trevor Larnach walk shifted win probability 6.6 percent in Minnesota's favor, and Josh Bell followed with a groundout that added another 11.3 percent, reflecting how the Twins were stringing together pressure at-bats. The fourth inning delivered the knockout blow: an Alex Jackson single pushed the needle another 7.8 percent, and Brooks Lee capped the sequence with a home run off Cecconi that swung win probability 25.7 percent in Minnesota's favor, the single largest play of the game. Cleveland's most meaningful offensive moment came in the bottom of the second, when José Ramírez singled off Bailey Ober to move the Guardians' win probability 6.6 percent upward, but that burst proved short-lived as Minnesota's bats responded emphatically.
Among the standout performers, Brooks Lee led all batters with a net WPA of plus 21.7 percent and a RE24 of plus 1.6, with his fourth-inning home run serving as the game's defining moment. Alex Jackson posted plus 13.2 percent WPA and plus 1.6 RE24, while Josh Bell contributed plus 12.0 percent WPA and plus 1.4 RE24 to anchor the middle of Minnesota's attack. On the pitching side, Travis Adams was the most impactful arm out of the bullpen at plus 12.3 percent WPA, supported by Kody Funderburk at plus 5.6 percent and Erik Sabrowski at plus 5.3 percent, as Minnesota's relief corps held Cleveland's lineup in check through the later innings despite the Guardians scratching across a run in both the eighth and ninth.