Randy Vásquez goes seven innings as Padres open series by beating Twins

Kevin Acee, The San Diego Union-Tribune on Aug 22, 2026

Published in Baseball

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SAN DIEGO — Randy Vásquez continued a run of excellent starting pitching, and the San Diego Padres continued their uninterrupted two-week stretch of on-and-off offense with an “on” night.

It was the kind of synergy that felt much needed at the start of a six-game homestand, coming off a series loss in New York and in a tight playoff race.

Vásquez allowed both of his runs and both of his hits in one inning and finished seven for the second time this season, and a four-run outburst in the fifth inning lifted the Padres to a 6-2 victory over the Twins on Friday night at Petco Park.

The Minnesota Twins arrived in San Diego two games below .500, 10 games worse than the Padres but in the same position.

The Padres began the night a game up in the race for the final National League wild-card spot while the Twins were a half-game up in the race for American League’s sixth-and-final playoff spot.

It appeared the Padres would remain one game ahead of the Arizona Diamondbacks, who held a big lead late against the Cincinnati Reds on Friday night.

Friday was the fifth game in a row a Padres pitcher turned in a quality start. Before this run, the Padres had not gotten three quality starts in a row this season.

It was also the sixth time in 12 games they scored at least five runs. Beginning with their 3-2 victory over the Houston Astros on Aug. 8, the Padres have scored four or fewer runs every other game and five or more in all the others. The contrast has actually been greater than that.

Their game-by-game scoring in that span: 3, 7, 3, 11, 4, 7, 1, 5, 1, 5, 2, 6.

Ty France got the Padres started in Friday’s first inning with a two-run homer to the second deck of seats beyond left field against the team for which he played the first four months of last season.

Vásquez retired nine straight batters to begin the game. His first pitch was a strike to six of those batters, just one batter saw three balls, and Vásquez was never behind 2-0.

Then that incredible precision vanished for an inning — and just an inning.

Luke Keaschall was the first Twins batter to get ahead 2-0 against Vásquez and led off the fourth inning with a hit.

A fielder’s choice erased Keaschall, but it would have been a double play had Manny Machado’s throw to second base not been wide and forced Jake Cronenworth to stretch out to catch it. Vásquez then had a cutter run in and hit Josh Bell’s pant leg before getting an out and leaving a cutter over the middle that Kody Clemens lined off the right field well to tie the game.

Twins starter Connor Prielipp, a rookie left-hander, escaped a bit of trouble the next two innings when Machado grounded into an inning-ending double play with runners on first and third in the fourth inning and Xander Bogaerts grounded into a double play to end the fifth.

But while Vásquez retired the next 10 batters he faced, Prielipp got run over by an avalanche of singles in the fifth inning.

The first of those came when Austin Hays beat out a dribbler to third base. And after a one-out walk, Fernando Tatis Jr., Luis Rengifo and Machado singled in succession with each of those hits driving in a run. The final run came on France’s sacrifice fly.