Cincinnati Reds starting pitcher Raisel Iglesias throws the ball against the Pittsburgh Pirates in the second inning at Great American Ball Park in Cincinnati, Ohio, on Saturday. (USA TODAY Sports)

Agencies/New York

With their offense sputtering and their lead in the wild-card race dwindling, the Minnesota Twins did what they had to do on Saturday to get a 3-2 victory over the Seattle Mariners.
The Twins scratched together three runs, two on wild pitches, with catcher Kurt Suzuki getting the game-winning hit with two outs in the bottom of the ninth when he ripped a single through the hole at shortstop.
“I was excited, I was pumped up,” Suzuki said. “Anybody who plays this game wants to be in that position. I don’t care where you are in the standings, you want to be in that spot.”
The win for Minnesota kept them one game ahead of the Baltimore Orioles in the race for the second wild-card spot in the American League and two games better than the Toronto Blue Jays.
“We needed a win,” Twins manager Paul Molitor said. “We’ve been finding out, wins get a little bit tougher. You have to find a way to stay with the game and tonight we were rewarded at the end.”
Trevor May got the win, pitching a shutout inning in the ninth before the Twins’ rally.
Twins starter Kyle Gibson allowed two runs on six hits and one walk, striking out four in seven innings.
He was in danger of seeing the game spiral out of control in his final innings, allowing a single and a double that put two runners in scoring position and nobody out.
But Gibson dug in, getting a fly out to shallow center and two groundouts to get out of the inning unscathed and with the Twins still down just one run.
“You just have to get the last two hitters out of your mind,” Gibson said. “That’s what I told myself before I got on the mound there. You have to execute three to seven pitches.”

ROOKIE IGLESIAS BEATS PIRATES
Rookie right-hander Raisel Iglesias pitched six solid innings while shortstop Eugenio Suarez drove in three runs to lift the Cincinnati Reds to a 4-3 victory over the Pittsburgh Pirates on Saturday.
Pittsburgh starter Gerrit Cole (14-5), one of the National League’s best pitchers during the past two seasons, remained winless in six career starts against Cincinnati after allowing three runs (two earned) and seven hits in five innings. He walked one and struck out eight but needed 98 pitches to get through five innings.
Iglesias, allowed two runs and four hits in 6-2/3 innings and retired nine straight after shortstop Kang Jung-Ho’s fourth inning homer.
After Travis Ishikawa’s pinch-RBI single cut the Reds’ lead to 3-2, Burke Badenhop replaced Iglesias and struck out pinch-hitter Francisco Cervelli to end the seventh inning.
Cincinnati added an insurance run on Suarez’s sacrifice fly in the eighth against right-hander Joe Blanton, who was making his Pirates debut after being acquired from the Kansas City Royals on Thursday.
Blanton pitched two innings and allowed a run and two hits with two strikeouts.
Cole has been dominant this season but has struggled against the Reds, going 0-2 with a 6.75 ERA in three starts.
Cincinnati got to him in the second when left fielder Marlon Byrd led off with a triple past Andrew McCutchen in center and then scored on Suarez’s sacrifice fly for a 1-0 lead.
The Pirates tied the score 1-1 in the fourth when Kang crushed a 2-2 pitch from Iglesias into the left-field bleachers for his eighth home run of the season.
The Reds regained the lead in the bottom of the fourth on Suarez’s RBI double before Bruce’s two-out double drove home second baseman Brandon Phillips in the fifth to put Cincinnati 3-1 up.

KERSHAW EXTENDS SCORELESS INNING STREAK
Left-hander Clayton Kershaw extended his streak of consecutive scoreless innings to 37 while leading the Los Angeles Dodgers to a 3-1 victory over the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday in front of 52,979 at Dodger Stadium.
Kershaw (9-6) retired the final 14 batters he faced, permitted only two hits and a walk and finished with seven strikeouts in eight innings.
The left-hander took the mound in the top of the ninth inning to an ovation, but was replaced by right-handed closer Kenley Jansen when C.J. Cron was announced as a pinch hitter.
David Murphy then replaced Cron and lined a single to right field off Jansen before pinch-hitter Kole Calhoun followed with a walk.
Jansen struck out second baseman Johnny Giavotella and center fielder Mike Trout before first baseman Albert Pujols dumped a broken-bat single down the left-field line to bring Murphy home and send Calhoun to third base.
Jansen, however, induced shortstop Erick Aybar to pop out to register his 19th save. Catcher Yasmani Grandal hit a two-run home run and finished 3-for-4.
The Angels lost their fifth consecutive game to match their longest losing streak this year.
The Dodgers took a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the sixth inning.
Second baseman Howie Kendrick began the inning with a single, took third base on first baseman Adrian Gonzalez’s single and scored on left fielder Scott Van Slyke’s sacrifice fly to the warning track in left field.
After right-hander Fernando Salas replaced left-handed Angels starter Andrew Heaney, Grandal propelled Salas’ 83 mph slider over the center-field fence for his 15th home run of the season.
Angels manager Mike Scioscia was ejected in the second inning by plate umpire Chris Segal for arguing balls and strikes.