PHILADELPHIA — Joe Ryan started on Friday night and put his team in a decent position to earn a win. Innings later, Jhoan Duran’s familiar intro played on the stadium scoreboard and the closer trotted in to nail down the save.

Just as the Twins drew it up, right?

Not quite.

Duran, of course, was traded at the July 31 trade deadline, along with many of his teammates. The flame-throwing closer, instead, was in sealing up a 3-1 Phillies’ win over the Twins on Friday night at Citizens Bank Park.

Not much has gone to plan for the Twins this season, but Ryan’s season — which officially concluded on Friday night — was one of the things that has. Though he was outdueled by Aaron Nola, whose bid for perfection was broken up by Christian Vázquez’s solo home run with two outs in the sixth inning, Ryan turned in one final strong start to cap the best season of his career.

On Friday night, he limited the Phillies to two runs on five hits in his five innings pitched, featuring some of his best stuff of the season. His four-seam fastball, for example, was up nearly 2 mph from his season average.

Ryan pitched in 31 games (30 starts) and posted a 3.47 ERA across a career-high 171 innings pitched.  While his second half of the season was rockier than the first — he had a 2.72 ERA before the all-star break and a 4.92 ERA after it — Ryan’s season represented another step forward as he was named an all-star for the first time in his career and established himself amongst the game’s best.

He took the loss Friday against Nola, who was virtually unsolvable for the Twins all night. Nola threw a season-high eight innings in the Phillies’ win, striking out nine. Aside from Vázquez’s home run, he gave up one other hit, a Kody Clemens leadoff triple in the eighth. Clemens ended the inning standing on third.

The Twins later mounted a challenge against Duran with both Vázquez and Ryan Jeffers collecting ninth-inning hits before he got Trevor Larnach to fly out to end the game.

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PHILADELPHIA — Jhoan Duran has heard about “Red October” and snippets about what postseason baseball is like in Philadelphia, but the Phillies closer is finding it hard to envision. After all, pitching in front of passionate fans at a packed Citizens Bank Park has made every night feel like the playoffs to him.

“It’s incredible,” he said. “I feel like when I played for Minnesota in the ’23 playoffs. That’s what I feel like when I pitch over here every day.”

Duran was traded to the Phillies on July 30, a day before the Twins’ front office imploded the roster, making seven more trades. The first of those was sending outfielder Harrison Bader to Philadelphia, as well, where the two now are thriving as the National League East winning-Phillies prepare for a playoff run.

Entering Friday’s contest with the Twins, Duran had a 2.29 ERA in 19 2/3 innings pitched with the Phillies. He has almost as many saves (15) as he did in the first four months of the season with the Twins (16). Bader, meanwhile, has become the Phillies’ every day center fielder. Entering Friday, he was hitting .314 with an .850 OPS since joining the Phillies.

“There are a lot of things that happen in the game that … are out of your control. When things do work out well, and I think a team does right by you and allows you to continue your season playing meaningful baseball, I’m very, very grateful for it,” Bader said.

The 31-year-old is playing for his sixth different organization, and July’s trade marked the second time he had been dealt at the deadline. A veteran on an expiring contract, a trade was expected.

But it was a newer experience for Duran, who was traded as a minor leaguer but had only ever played for the Twins as a major leaguer, and has two more seasons before he hits free agency. Duran said he was playing in his backyard with his son when he got the call letting him know he had been traded.

“I was shocked a little bit. It’s not like a big surprise to me because I knew maybe something would happen, but I didn’t want to accept the idea that something would happen,” Duran said. “That’s a surprise to me because I wanted to be on the team. They gave me the opportunity to be in the major leagues for a first time and I wanted to be there for a long time. They gave me a good opportunity here, too, so I’ll take it.”

From the moment he stepped onto the Citizens Bank Park diamond, Duran has been a hit in Philadelphia. Along with the closer, the Twins also sent along his electric entrance, which quickly went viral on social media when the Phillies introduced it for the first time.

And soon, it very well could be used in postseason play once again as the duo — along with former Twin Max Kepler — chase after a World Series ring.

“I’m just really glad the Twins dealt me to a contender,” Bader said. “I don’t want to speak for Duran, but I’m sure he feels the same way.”

Briefly

Mick Abel, whom the Twins received as part of the return for Duran, will start Saturday night’s game for Minnesota against Philadelphia. … Kody Clemens, whom the Twins acquired from the Phillies in April, got a nice round of applause from the fans during his first-inning at-bat.

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By JIM VERTUNO

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — DNA evidence has helped to identify a new suspect in the unsolved killing of four teenage girls at a yogurt shop in 1991, a man who died by suicide in 1999, police said Friday.

In a statement, police said they had made a “significant breakthrough” and that DNA tests have led investigators to Robert Eugene Brashers. Police said the case known as the “Yogurt Shop Murders” remains open and scheduled a Monday news conference to detail their findings.

“Our team never gave up working this case,” Austin police said in a statement.

Amy Ayers, 13; Eliza Thomas, 1; and sisters Jennifer and Sarah Harbison, ages 17 and 15, were bound, gagged and shot in the head at the “I Can’t Believe It’s Yogurt” store where two of them worked. The building was then set on fire.

The murders stunned Texas’ capital city and became known as one of the area’s most notorious crimes. Two men who were teenagers at the time of the murders were later tried, convicted and sent to death row and life in prison before their convictions were eventually reversed on appeal.

The case was also the subject of “The Yogurt Shop Murders,” an HBO documentary series that came out last month.

Brashers died in 1999 when he shot himself during an hours-long standoff with police at a motel in Kennett, Missouri.

By MATT BROWN, Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Congressional Black Caucus kicked off its annual legislative conference this week, which has been upended by President Donald Trump’s second term and by the presence of National Guard patrols near the conference’s venue.

The 62-member caucus, all of whom are Democrats, gathered with business leaders, activists, policy experts, local government officials, and other professionals from across the country to strategize how to build its new agenda and to counter Trump’s policies, which have disrupted federal government programs that address civil rights, education, healthcare, housing, immigration and labor policy, among other areas.

While this year’s conference has featured the usual panels, strategy sessions and cocktail parties, many attendees hoped to hear from the “conscience of the Congress” — a moniker bestowed on the CBC for its civil rights work — about what lessons can be learned from American history for the current political climate, and how lawmakers would govern should they win future elections.

Here are some comments from the CBC lawmakers who attended this year’s conference:

Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina

“This is probably going to be one of the most consequential weeks that you have ever spent in your lives,” said Clyburn, the former House Democratic leader, during an address at the outset of the conference. “Take it from me: we are on the precipice of losing this democracy. We are. And if you don’t think so, take a journey through the history of the country.”

“I would hope that I would not leave this Earth, and my children and grandchildren would not be sentenced to having to live the life that their grandparents and parents lived,” said the 85-year-old congressman.

FILE – Incoming Congressional Black Caucus chair Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., discusses caucus priorities for the 119th Congress and the Trump administration, Dec. 4, 2024, on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)

Rep. Yvette Clarke of New York

“This is not a conventional time. This is the time that we make for ourselves our own destiny,” Clarke, chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, said in an address to conference attendees.

“This is not a situation where we can necessarily say, well, look, those people in Congress have got it. Because the Congress is broken,” Clarke said. “We delivered democracy to the United States of America. Were it not for the abolitionists, were it not for the Civil Rights leaders, were it not for the foot soldiers on the ground, we’d still be living in apartheid. So let’s get it straight and let’s straighten up our backs.”

Clarke added: “I believe in us because were it not for the folks who came before me, I wouldn’t be standing here today as chairwoman of the largest Black Caucus in the history of the United States.”

FILE – State Sen. Jennifer McClellan, D-Hanover, speaks at The Call for Action on Gun Safety, Jan. 13, 2023, in Richmond, Va. (AP Photo/John C. Clark, File)

Rep. Jennifer McClellan of Virginia

“It’s not that if (Democrats) get the gavel, we rebuild back to what we had. We are also taking this opportunity to see what we can start from scratch,” said McClellan.

“There are some Republicans in the committee rooms, or in delegations, who share our concerns on some issues, whether it’s the NIH funding cuts, whether it’s First Amendment issues, or whether it’s clean energy rollbacks. And they are taking their concerns behind the scenes to the administration. And in some cases, they’ve been successful and at least making the bad less bad.”

FILE – Rep. Glenn Ivey, D-Md., joins elected officials and activists in a call to end the presence of National Guard troops in the District of Columbia on the order of President Donald Trump, at the Capitol in Washington, Sept. 4, 2025. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)

Rep. Glenn Ivey of Maryland

“It’s going to be a new day, in part because they’ve changed the governing structure so much,” Ivey said of how Democrats are planning on governing in response to Trump’s changes to the federal government.

“Part of what we’re going to have to do is fire a big chunk of the bureaucracy that he’s putting in right now, just move them out and start over from scratch,” said Ivey, who represents the suburbs of Washington. “And we’ve got to make sure we understand that for a lot of the legislation we’ve done, we rely on particular government agencies to make it work. That’s not going to fly anymore. The Department of Justice and the Civil Rights Division is an example of that.”

FILE – Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove, D-Calif., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill, Sept. 11, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib, File)

Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove of California

“The reality is that some of the bad stuff is just going to happen,” said Kamlager-Dove. “There is no strategy to stop some of the bad stuff except to continue to educate folks about the hypocrisy and the duplicity that is happening.”

“Many of these special elections, many of these local elections that are happening ever since Donald Trump came into office and started implementing his Project 2025, Democrats have been winning,” she said. “The strategy is to engage community-based organizations. The strategy is to work more diligently with our legal community. The strategy is to take everything to the court. The strategy is to create some outrage. The strategy is to fight the battles at the local elections. The facts of strategy are to make sure that we are shored up so that when 2028 comes around, folks are ready.”

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Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts

“I think that the air feels a lot heavier than it does normally. That being said, after every session, after every engagement that I’ve had, I leave emboldened and more fortified,” said Pressley.

“It’s so important that we are leaning into community, but also that we are strategizing, that we are being intentional in our thought partnership and in our organizing, in the work of resistance and the work of reimagining,” she said. “So I would say, you know, in this moment right now, I feel very encouraged.”