Game 125: Twins at Rays

Santana (2-4, 5.53 ERA, 4.99 xFIP) vs. Karns (7-5, 3.44 ERA, 3.81 xFIP)

Interestingly, Santana's ERA and K/9 are the same. He's also not pitched well since starting his season. It'd be nice of him to reverse that tonight.

The Twins face Karns who's having a pretty good year. Hopefully that means he's not a middling Jeremy who will dominate the lineup. That said, I fully expect Sano to punch a couple holes in the roof at the Trop tonight.

66 thoughts on “Game 125: Twins at Rays”

  1. You know how prospects always get hyped and you want to believe and then you know that you shouldn't, especially not right away because no one is that good that soon except for maybe a Joe Mauer. And then there was Miguel Sano.

  2. Dazzle had no more than said Santana didn't have to worry about the Rays swinging early in the count in the first inning than Jennings hit a first-pitch single.

  3. When Rosario swung at bad pitches, it was a bad at-bat. When Hunter swings at bad pitches, it's "He wants to drive in some runs!"

    1. It's my go to party, tubin', Mardi Gras, dinner party beer. Drinks like an ipa, same abv(ish) as miller light.

  4. I know you hate to pull your starter in the third inning, but we've got a big and fully rested bullpen and Santana clearly had nothing. Molitor waited too long to get him out of there.

  5. I didn't catch who they were talking about, but Dazzle said about someone, "If he can't play left field, how can he play first base?" He might want to think about Harmon Killebrew's career, among others.

  6. Much like Only throwing outside sliders to _elm_n, why would you ever throw anything up in the zone to Dozier?

    1. He will chase high stuff, and I'm sure that's in the scouting report, except I don't think pitchers realize how high it has to be to be out of his power zone.

  7. If Neal Cotts was such a great addition, why is he being treated like a middle/mop-up reliever. It doesn't look like Cotts is going to take any of the critical relief outings away from Duensing.

        1. Didn't he come in with two runners on and only one out after one run was already in in a one run game? Granted, it's only the middle innings, but, and I'll have to check fangraphs, that seems moderately high leverage.

          1. I was surprised they went to Cotts that early, too, but it was important to get out of the inning. The trouble is Cotts will probably only go one more inning, so we're still going to have to get some innings from someone.

          2. Well, my other concern was Cotts has some pretty extreme splits and he was brought in to face a couple switch hitters with men on base. I think Duensing would be better suited for that with his somewhat backward splits this year. I like the idea of bringing in better relievers earlier in the game with a lead to protect, but I get the feeling that Molitor will go with long men or lesser relievers just because it is before the sixth inning. Maybe he's changing his pattern now that we're getting late in the season and the Twins are still in it.

    1. The Twins needed someone to stop the bleeding. Why keep throwing out subpar relievers there?

    1. Well, I would have to go with Dozier since he has more than twice as many as Sano right now and Sano has less games left than he has played this season. It would be very impressive for Sano to get to Dozier's current total of 26.

        1. I know the height of the strikezones in Gameday are rather rough. It's hard to gauge where a player's strikezone really is vertically. Or he misjudged it and it didn't drop as far as he expected, causing a pop-up instead of another homer.

    1. Casali came up lame while running around the bases after his home run. I missed what happened to Jennings, but I think he got hurt, too.

    2. Jennings rehurt a knee and the catcher dude hurt himself on a HR (stepped on first base funny, I think)

  8. It will be interesting to see if Fien gets two innings (assuming he pitches effectively) and if Jepsen or May is the next pitcher to come out of the bullpen.

    1. I'd give him another inning unless he gets into trouble. Not that some of these guys can't pitch two games in a row, but it would be nice to save a couple of guys for tomorrow night.

  9. You'd think the Rays would want to use some specific Romero, rather than just going with any Romero.

      1. If Belle's hips did not degenerate, he would have been a Hall of Famer. Bad attitude towards the press and all.

        In 1995, 60% of Belle's hits where for extra bases. SIXTY PERCENT! (52 doubles, a triple, 50 home runs)

  10. Its been 10 outs since a run has scored. I hope the Twins correct this by scoring 8.

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