One big fifth inning lifts Mud Hens past Saints, 3-0

A five-inning, two-earned-run start from Zebby Matthews should have kept the Twins paying attention. Instead, the St. Paul Saints left Fifth Third Field with a 3-0 shutout loss to Toledo, and the real story was how close Matthews came to turning a rough start to his season into something usable.

Matthews, a 25-year-old right-hander drafted by Minnesota in the eighth round in 2022 out of Western Carolina, looked in control for most of the night on April 11 in Toledo, Ohio. After allowing a leadoff single, he retired eight straight hitters and carried a shutout deep into the game before the fifth inning flipped everything. The Mud Hens opened that frame with three straight singles, Max Burt drove in the first run, a throwing error on a play at first let another run score, and a wild pitch set up Gage Workman’s RBI single to finish the damage. In one inning, Toledo scored all three of its runs and took the game away.

The line was not a wipeout for Matthews, and that matters. He worked 5.0 innings, allowed seven hits, struck out five and was charged with three runs, two earned. For a pitcher who entered the game at 0-1 with a 12.27 ERA in his 2026 Triple-A work, it was a step in the right direction. One bad inning did not bury the outing; it defined the result. That is the frustrating part for St. Paul and the encouraging part for Matthews. If the Twins are still watching the Saints’ rotation for help, this was the kind of start that keeps a pitcher in the conversation even without a win.

The Saints simply gave him nothing to work with. St. Paul finished with only four baserunners, and only one of them reached second base. Emmanuel Rodriguez added the club’s final hit in the seventh, while Tanner Schobel and Orlando Arcia were the other Saints to reach safely. A night after St. Paul beat Toledo 4-3 and collected double-digit hits for the first time in its previous 10 games, the offense went quiet again and never built a meaningful threat.

The bullpen did its part. John Brebbia struck out the side in the sixth and finished with two scoreless innings, and Dan Altavilla handled the eighth without allowing a run. That only sharpened the contrast with the offense’s silence. St. Paul has now been shut out twice in five days, a blunt reminder that even with a roster the club described on opening day as featuring four Top 100 prospects and nine Twins top-30 prospects, one clean inning can still decide everything. The Saints will try again Sunday at 1:05 p.m. CT, with Kendry Rojas scheduled to start against Toledo’s Lael Lockhart.