Late night baseball + holiday weekend + terrible baseball team = maybe 20 comments for tonight's game?
Even if the Twins were fielding a decent team, it would be a tough task to garner a win because King Felix is on the bump for the Mariners. Pat "I'm not Dizzy" Dean goes for the locals.
Its been a long tough week for me, I hope the Twins put on a good show just to lift my spirits.
1st inning HR derby
Lets remember the good times. Here is Jim Thome just after mashing some taters for Philly.
JOEY BATS!!!
ok it was a Mauer home run but it was pretty cool!
First Pitch 1:10 p.m.
Phil Hughes (1-6, 5.70 ERA, 1.29 WHIP, 27 K)
Marcus Stroman (4-1, 4.23 ERA, 1.23 WHIP, 43 K)
Phil Hughes was far from bad the last time he pitched, giving up just one earned run, but he went only 6.1 innings on 75 pitches. It was later revealed that he's been throwing with shoulder fatigue, so we can probably include the Twins training staff in the whole total system failure thing. Today he squares off against Marcus Stroman, who is coming off his worst start ever after giving up 7 runs on 13 hits to the Rays. Momentum, thy name is today's starting pitchers.
Meanwhile, in Bizarro World, the Atosennim Sniwt have won 31 of their games so far this season while losing just 11 for a .738 winning percentage. They lead the league in Slugging and OPS, ERA, Saves, and WHIP. The Sniwt maintain a sizable lead on their division, and are favored by many to win the Bizarro World Series.
Play ball.
Josh Donaldson was tossed out of the game for doing something.
If the Twins can score some runs, there is a reasonable chance that they can get win #11. Tyler "The Duffman" Duffy is on the mound.
Rex Robbie Grossman gets his Twins debut tonight. Baseball-Reference says he has played in 190 games in 3 season with the Astros but to be honest, I have never heard of this guy.
Ervin Santana faces off against Marco Estrada. While both pitchers sport 1-2 records, Santana has managed 29.1 innings over 6 starts with a decent 3.38 ERA and 3.36 FIP, but a 1.50 WHIP, 124 ERA+, opponents batting average of .281 and BABIP of .341 and only 27 strikeouts on the year.
On the other hand, Estrada has pitched 43.2 innings in 7 starts with a shiny 2.89 ERA, a 3.64 FIP, 1.14 WHIP, 141 ERA+, opponents BA of .199 and BABIP of .241 and 41 strikeouts. He's seen only 2.06 runs/9 of support compared to 3.38 for Santana...we'll see how it goes.
The Twins brand has lost it's luster during the first 8 weeks of the season ... more losses than wins, poor hitting, fielding, pitching, managing and roster construction in general resulting in lots of moves in non-competitive season. Moves that appear to be, to borrow a well-worn analogy, like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. Hopefully for the long-suffering diehard fans (5 of 6 years of 90+ losses!?) and those youngsters in the stands getting their first taste of live baseball (there's gotta be a few families taking advantage of the dirt-cheap secondary market, eh?) may the home team bring home a win today!
Electric Boogaloo
Admit it. You had this one circled on your calendar for a while now didn’t you? Phil Hughes v. Mike Pelfrey. Sure they are a combined 1-10 but we all know wins and losses means nothing at the Major League Level. This is Hughesy versus Big Pelf. Former stable mates now going head-to-head for supremacy of the bottom of the AL Central. It doesn’t get any better than this and after yesterday’s epic yet failed comeback by the Twins, you just know it’s payback time. First pitch at 6:10p Central.
