Boy…I’m glad I didn’t get to catch much of this game live. Even in fast-forward, I caught myself grimacing with each passing inning. Hardy led off the scoring for Baltimore by belting a solo home run to left-center (while playing solid defense throughout the series. I know it's stupid, but I still can't figure out what they were thinking when they traded him). For a while, it looked like that single run might be all the O’s would need. Something called Jason Hammel no-hit the Twins through 7 innings. Even where they picked up a base runner via walks, Doumit and Willingham graciously helped him out of the jam by hitting into double plays. Jason Hammel came to Baltimore in a deal that sent Jeremy Guthrie to Colorado. The Twins hitters seemed to sense the connection.
Then in the 8th, Mountie broke up the no-no with a double off the wall in right. ConsensualPork followed it up with a deep liner to left, spoiling the shut-out. Things began to look interesting with a runner on 2nd, nobody out and Doumit, Burroughs and Hughes due up. Doumit struck out swinging but then Burroughs drew a four pitch walk and it looked like the Twins were going to make a game of it. Alas, Luke Hughes came up swinging. He swung at the first pitch…and missed. Then another swing and another miss before finally taking a pitch. Unfortunately, a nice breaking ball on the last pitch froze him and and he argued over his shoulder as he headed back to the dugout. Parmelee, pinch hitting for Revere, promptly popped out to right and the “threat” was over. Hammel finished with 8 innings of 2 hit ball, giving up 1 run, striking out 5 Twins batters and taking the “W”.
Doumit made up for his 0-3 day a little bit in the bottom half of the inning by gunning out Nick Johnson (trying to advance on a slightly passed ball) with a laser throw to Casilla at 2nd. Nice defensive play, but they picked him up (and sent Butters down) for his bat and he’s 0 for the season thus far.
Snizzleset went 5 innings giving up 1 run on 4 hits, striking out 1 and walking 2. He was only able to get first pitch strikes on 12 of the 21 batters he faced but otherwise pitched decently in a spot start. He left with the Twins down only 1 run. Unfortunately, the bats weren’t there today and Stillysoot took the loss.
Joe was 0-4. He was 1-10 for the series with the lone hit an infield single.
Justin was 1-2 with a walk and 4-10 for the series with 2 doubles. His double today was his 233rd, pushing him past Harmon Killebrew into sole possession of 8th place on the Twins' career list.
In other news, Bubba Watson beat Louis Oosthuizen on the second, sudden-death playoff hole to win the Masters. Watson finished the day 10 under. He is now ranked #4 in the world. Notably, Oosthuizen notched an extremely rare double eagle on the par-5 second hole. It was only the fourth double eagle in Masters history.
Double-eagle makes no sense. That would imply that one was four under par (-2x2). I greatly prefer albatross.
I'd never heard albatross before and I shoot double-bogeys waaaay too often so that's what I went with...thanks for the knowledge.
@dw - I thought pretty much the same thing, but it was more like "holy sh*t that was a crazy shot!" I read somewhere that Watson rarely hits the ball straight, using more hooks, slices, flares and draws in his game.
Yeah, that shot out of the woods was insane. When they showed the way the shot set up, I didn't think there was any way he was going to be able to get within 20 feet of the green, and he goes ahead and puts it to within makable birdy distance.
Also, that was the first double-eagle I'd witnessed live, so that was cool.
Every time I see Hardy in an Orioles uniform it pains me. I'd hoped he'd end up a Twin for some time before that trade, and thought he played pretty great in 2010 when he wasn't hurt. I didn't think he'd go absolutely bananas like he did last year with the Twins, but I thought it was really dumb to cut bait on a middle infielder given how terrible the Twins' middle infield depth is. And the reasoning was really, really poor.
just curious, what was the reasoning for letting him go?
something to the effect of wanting more speed in the lineup. that, and he was getting "expensive".
The more I think about this (and I was doing so on my way into work this morning), the more upset it makes me. I think the move borders on indefensible. And that was before he went nuts in B-more.
Well, he was never going to post 30 home runs in MN, but I loved his defense and that fact that he had any power at all so much that if he would've posted a couple seasons exactly like the one he did when he was with us, I would've been satisfied.
...but Jim Hoey was cool, too.
Yeah, for sure. Even if he popped 10-15 homers, had a somewhat above average bat, and played great defense, he would've been a very good piece to have on the team for the next 3-4 years.
All of this - especially considering what they trotted out at SS last year...ugh.
Exactly, when your opening day shortstop has the season Nishioka did coming off even a mildly "disappointing" year for Hardy (1+ WAR, even though according to those metrics, he was actually below average defensively, which didn't jive with what I saw, but whatever, defensive metrics are still sketchy), it was utter murder to watch.
Hey, to be fair, we probably saw just as many homeruns by having Hoey as we would've if Hardy was still around.
This is an underrated point. Hoey gave up a .942 OPS. I don't think Hardy could have given us as much offense to watch.
That hook shot from out out of the woods that pretty much sealed things for Bubba was one of the craziest shots I have ever seen in a major.
After this weekend, I feel a little better about Willingham. That Mauer-Morneau-Willingham trio could be dangerous (if healthy ya know)
I'm enjoying the fact that I read "ConsensualPork" as "Consuela Pork"
The offense was poor all series, but the pitching was good enough. Kind of the opposite of the preseason projections for this team.
Holy hockey pucks! I had no idea that Justin had been around long enough to pass Harmon in anything significant. Hard to believe.
Harmon leads the franchise with 2329 games played, and is second in plate appearances at 9464 (some of those are with the Senators prior to the move), but he had only 277 career doubles with the franchise. The franchise leader, Sam Rice, had 479. The Minnesota leader is Puckett with 414.
With decent health, Morny should move into 5th on the Twins' career list this season, passing Cuddy (239), the Rat (252) and eye-eye (259).