2017 Twins Game Logs

Game 59: Twins at Giants

55 Comments

Nik Turley vs. Matt Cain, 3:05 p.m.

Aside from Ervin Santana, the Twins' starting rotation coming out of spring training is in disarray. And the Twins have so little depth that they have recalled 2 starting pitchers and placed them back in the rotation after they had lost their spots due to ineffectiveness. And that was before June.

Thanks to Hector Santiago's sore shoulder, the Twins were forced to find another starter. The Twins decided not to go with Chris Heston, who they recently claimed off waivers, or even try to stretch out Tyler Duffey, who has pretty much been the Twins' best reliever, and instead called up Nik Turley.

What is a Nik Turley? On the surface, this appears to be a lot like a lot of the Twins' desperate moves this season that haven't worked out so well, like a spot start by Nick Tepesch (who was released off the 40-man to make room for Heston) or calling up Jason Wheeler or Drew Rucinski to be fresh arms for the bullpen or even claiming Heston. Turley is a former 50th-round draft pick that the team signed as a nondescript minor league free agent in the offseason, so bringing him up just would seem to be another callup of a replacement-level arm for a team desperate to find rotation help.

However, he's put some numbers in the minors that make him more intriguing than the typical minor league free agent. What's most noticeable is a sudden surge in strikeouts. Turley was drafted in 2008 and has never put up big strikeout rates (or even more than 1 per inning) until last year, when he suddenly struck out 48 in 35 2/3 innings. However, that was when he pitched almost exclusively out of the bullpen in AA, so the Red Sox weren't overly impressed and let him leave as a free agent.

The Twins assigned him to AA despite being pretty old for that level (he'll be 27 on 9/11) and he made a couple relief appearances before moving into the rotation. He instantly impressed with 5 hitless innings in his first start, then he really opened some eyes when he struck out 14 batters, including a Southern League record 8 in a row, on April 25. The Twins then immediately decided to move Turley up to Rochester to provide a bigger challenge.

Turley again made a couple scoreless relief appearances before moving into the rotation. In his first start on May 16, he struck out 9 batters in 4 scoreless innings. The Red Wings continued to stretch him out over his next few outings before it all came together on June 6 when Turley struck out 15 batters in 6 innings, meaning 15 of the 18 outs he got were on strikeouts, and 14 of those Ks were swinging. He also struck out the first 9 batters he faced.

Of course, the big question is where did this come from? As far as I can tell, he hasn't added a pitch or switched to an unusual pitching motion. Turley is 6-foot-4 and 195 pounds, so he is tall and thin and throws over the top with a compact windup that is reminiscent of David Price. Turley, unfortunately, doesn't have Price's velocity.

He doesn't have an unusual repertoire. He throws a big curveball and a slider to go along with his fastball. A story on him from 4 years ago talked about his curveball and changeup and didn't mention a slider, so he might have scrapped his changeup and added the slider.  Turley's recent surge might be him just maturing and figuring out how to pitch.

It's doubtful that Turley is going to continue to be so dominant at the major league level. However, Turley deserves a chance to prove he belongs at this level and the Twins have no other viable options at the moment. Maybe whatever magic or luck the Twins have used to propel them to a 2.5-game lead 1/3 of the way through the season will continue with Turley.

The timing is right for Turley to make his debut. The Giants are dead last in MLB in OPS+ at a woeful 75. Plus, the Twins have won 3 in a row and have already clinched a series win and a winning roadtrip, so the pressure is off for Turley. Of course, when a 50th-round draft pick reaches the major leagues, the pressure is already off.

55 thoughts on “Game 59: Twins at Giants”

  6. So far, fairly decent for Turley. A ground ball double, not hit very hard but right down the line, led to a couple of runs in the first, but he's followed it with two shutout innings. Let's get him some more runs.

  7. Through four innings, Turley has done about as well as he could reasonably be expected to do. He hasn't been anything great, but he's managed to keep them in the game. That's about as much as I hoped for.

  11. I know what we think of the "win" statistic around here, but it would still be cool for Turley if he could get through the fifth with the lead and the Twins could get him the win today.

  13. I'm on radio, so I don't know if the umps got it right or not, but when a bunt hits the batter, why can't you review whether he was in the batter's box or not?

      1. That's good to know, but I still don't understand why that call isn't reviewable.

  15. On the one hand, I can understand not wanting to wait to long to get Turley out of there. On the other hand, I don't know that there's a lot of reason to think Chris Heston will be significantly better.

    1. True. Pitcher's spot is leading off, however. I think we saw all of him that we are gonna get.

      1. I don't know that I'd say "really good", as he gave up an RBI single, but certainly not bad.

  19. So has anyone figured out why belisle keeps getting late innings in close games?

    3. And why he was left in there so long? For a man who's been in baseball as long as Molitor has, he can be really slow to react to situations sometimes. It's like when he makes a plan, he's going to stick to it no matter what.

    4. This only his second blown lead all season. He's had 3 previous outing when allowing multiple runs, but they all came when the team was already trailing, although 2 of them were 1 run games when he entered. This is his 26th game this year and he's allowed runs in just 7 of them, so he's had 19 scoreless outings.

      1. Which is all the more reason to take him out quickly when you see him getting hit. When he's bad, he's really bad.

        1. Yep. I'm guessing Molitor felt like he had to have Belisle get through the inning because he went to the bullpen so early. I'm really not sure why Heston was taken out for the sixth with the bottom of the order coming up. With no off day coming anytime soon, when you use a long reliever, you need to get more than 3 outs. Now we have Mejia and Gibson going the next two days and a bunch of relievers were used.

  21. Draft Hunter Greene Monday. Sign him Tuesday morning then fly him to Target Field.

  22. This bolsters our run differential to even more ridiculous levels.

    I remember in the days of my youth how pitchers could pitcher for two, sometimes even three innings at a time when they were being effective!

  23. My guess on losing the radio feed temporarily is that Dazzle accidentally kicked the plug out.

  26. Yes, Atteberry, it would've been nice if the Twins had added on runs, but I don't think there's any way they could've scored them faster than the bullpen gave them up today.

  27. Well, it was still a 6-4 road trip. It could easily have been 8-2, but 6-4 on a ten-game West Coast Swing isn't bad. We'll just have to settle for 135-27!

    1. I would say 6-4 is very good, especially on the road. It's just disappointing when you know that they could have gone 8-2, which really blows my mind when I look at the run differential. Of course, this is the 30-year anniversary of the only team to be outscored during the regular season that won the World Series.

  28. When Belisle entered the game, the Twins had a 66% chance of winning the game. When he left, they had a 5.5% chance of winning, so everything that happened after that was pretty much inconsequential other than using up relievers.

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