It’s one thing to lose to the Los Angeles Dodgers, the best team in baseball; it’s quite another to lose to the team across town, a club that’s 23 games out of first place in the AL West.
But that’s exactly what happened to the Twins. After an encouraging win Friday over the Angels, they dropped the next two games, including Sunday’s 4-2 loss, and now find themselves 2.5 games back of the Cleveland Guardians in the division. More discouraging: they are tied with the Chicago White Sox in third place.
When the brain trust of Falvey & Co. went to work and came up with the pitching the Twins so desperately needed at the trade deadline, they probably had no idea that the team’s offense would disappear. But it has and in a big way.
During the two losses to the Halos, the Twins went 0-for-18 with runners in scoring position and left 18 men on base. When you fail to produce like that, it’s hard to blame the Twins bullpen, which blew the save and took the loss in Saturday’s extra-innings meltdown. Relievers Jorge Lopez and Emilio Pagan didn’t have much of a cushion to work with.
The Twins now come home to face the Kansas City Royals on Monday. After losing to the Angels, and watching the Royals two-hit the Dodgers on Sunday, this upcoming series is not a gimme by any stretch of the imagination. The Royals, who are 20 games under .500, will not play the Twins like a fourth-place club. Joe Ryan gets the ball.
Extra innings…
-Me and my son are back in the Twin Cities to see the Twins (of course) after previous attempts were derailed by the pandemic. We thought about coming last summer, but didn’t feel quite ready to risk it, so instead we visited Harmon Killebrew’s home town of Payette, Idaho. It’s good to be back in Minnesota. The Twins are in town all week. We have good seats for Monday’s game and probably will sit in the bleachers on Tuesday.
-And then there was this…
Lynx stinks. Twins stinks. Vikings stinks. We all stinks.
— Reusse (@Patrick_Reusse) August 14, 2022