Just when I think I'm out, they reel me back in.

Okay. That's probably overstated. While the Twins looked very good today in ending a five-game losing streak, I doubt too many fans got too excited over salvaging the final game of an important four-game home series. Unless the Twins go on a serious hot streak to end the season, I imagine most of us will look at Saturday's doubleheader sweep by the Angels as when  we realized that getting into the postseason probably wasn't in the cards this year. The Twins did get back to a tie with the Angels in the standings, but they're still 2 1/2 games back of the Astros with only 13 games left in the season. If the Astros go 6-6, the Twins will have to finish 9-4 just to tie them.

But fans should be excited. Not so much for this season but for the seasons ahead. It should be readily apparent that this team is much better than it was at the beginning of the season.

And I'm not just talking about Miguel Sano. Certainly he's probably the biggest reason. The Twins haven't had a power hitter so feared at least since Justin Morneau took a knee to the helmet in Toronto. And maybe not since Harmon Killebrew left for one sad season in Kansas City. Sano and the Killer certainly have the most similar of skillsets in huge power, great patience and the ability to thrill fans even with one of their numerous strikeouts. Sano showed the power on Saturday with a monster game-tying home run in the 7th inning. On Sunday, he showed his great eye at the plate with two more walks, plus he added a single.

Twins fans expected Sano to burst onto the scene sometime this season, but it is doubtful anyone could see Sano being so good, so fast. Fans also were expecting to see the rotation ace and a great all-around centerfielder and leadoff hitter to emerge from the minors as well. They just didn't expect it to be Tyler Duffey and Aaron Hicks.

Duffey has pretty much come out of nowhere to clearly be the Twins' best starting pitcher at this point. He leads the Twins starters in ERA and xFIP and his K rate of over 8 is the best the Twins have seen since Francisco Liriano was traded to the White Sox. Duffey may not be a "true ace," but if the Twins have 5 Duffeys, they would be tied with the Yankees for second-best xFIP for starters in the AL.

What's made his emergence even more exciting is that so little was expected of him coming into this season. MLB Pipeline had him ranked the Twins' 14th-best prospect and Aaron Gleeman had him ranked 31st. When he was drafted in the fifth round of the 2012 draft, Duffey was considered a Twins typical college pitcher draft pick with great control and not great stuff. Duffey started this season in AA and now Twins fans are pinning their hopes on him being at the top of the rotation in a run for the postseason.

Duffey was a stopper on Sunday, dominating the Angels in seven shutout innings. He only allowed three hits: a bunt and 2 slow dribblers up the middle. He also struck out 7. Maybe the most exciting thing about Duffey is there is little mystery about him. When he gets to two strikes, he's going to his curveball, and it doesn't seem to matter. Batters find it really hard to hit and even harder to lay off. As long as he continues to mix in an occasional two-strike 93-94 mph fastball in there, he'll continue to have great success as long as he's consistently ahead in the count.

As for Hicks, there was a lot of people doubting his ability to hit at the major league level as well. After being the Twins' Opening Day centerfielder the previous two seasons, he began this year in AAA while the Twins used a combination of Jordan Schafer and Shane Robinson in center. With top prospect Byron Buxton looming in AA, the present and future did not look good for Hicks.

However, he got off to a great start and earned a promotion at the beginning of May. While his hitting had improved on his first two disastrous seasons, he still had a disappointing .563 OPS. However, he had home runs in back-to-back games the next two days and took off from there. Since July 4, Hicks has a .793 OPS. He showed his great all-around play Sunday with two walks and a nice sliding catch in the first inning. Perhaps most impressive were his two hits, both from his weaker left side. The first hit he pulled a fastball on the inside corner to right field. The second was an RBI single up the middle on a low and away changeup. The old Aaron Hicks never would have been able to get both of those hits from the left side.

If the Twins are to really turn this ship around and be a consistent contender, they need more of these type of surprises.

Well, that was about as good as it gets.

A great formula for winning is to get the lead early and keep adding on to it and have your starter go deep without ever threatening to let the other team get back in it. The Twins did that on Sunday . The fact that it was against Chris Sale was even better.

It's really bizarre what the Twins have done to Sale this year. After all, he's a great pitcher. No, really. He is!

Only twice all season has Sale been pulled from a start before finishing 5 innings and throwing at least 95 pitches. Both times came against the Twins: on Sunday and on April 30 at Target Field when he gave up a season-high 8 earned runs in just 3 IP.

All this came a day after the Twins played their worst game of this roadtrip. Tommy Milone got knocked out early and the Twins couldn't add any more runs after basically being handed two runs early. Plus the defense had several miscues.

That loss meant the Twins would be forced to beat Sale, one of the best pitchers in the American League, to avoid a demoralizing series loss after winning 2 of 3 in Kansas City against the AL's best team. The Twins also needed to win Sunday to go home with a winning recond on their nine-game roadtrip.

Miguel Sano had an RBI single in the first inning to give the Twins a quick lead, but the Twins didn't stop there. After Trevor Plouffe singled, Torii Hunter had an epic at-bat where he fouled off several close two-strike pitches, two a couple more close ones for balls and then a ripped a fastball into the left-center field stands for a 4-0 lead.

That was more than enough for Kyle Gibson, who had his A game on Sunday. He only allowed 5 hits and 1 walk while getting 7 strikeouts and 15 ground balls in his 7 2/3 innings. The best part was that the Twins only needed one out from Casey Fien and Kevin Jepsen and Trevor May weren't needed at all. If the want to go on a protracted run, they need to be able to get plenty of wins where they don't to use their best relief pitchers.

The bad news was Texas beat Oakland on Sunday, so the Twins remained 1 game back of the Rangers for the final playoff spot. However, who would have thought the Twins would be in such a position with just 20 games remaining. Even better, the Twins play 13 of their final 20 games at home, where they have played great all season. The win Sunday marked the end of a 25-game stretch that included 19 road games. The Twins went 15-10, although the lost a half game in the standings to Texas. However, they did pass Baltimore and the Angels in the standings.

The Twins will open their homestand against the Tigers, who split a doubleheader on Sunday with the Indians. Because of rainouts on Friday and Saturday, Justin Verlander had to pitch on Sunday and won't be available for the series against the Twins. The Tigers also traded away Twins nemesis David Price to the Blue Jays, so the Twins will face Kyle Lobstein, Alfredo Simon and TBD instead. Matt Boyd is a possibility for the third game.

While the Twins are facing the last-place Tigers, the Rangers will be playing host to the first-place Astros, who are riding high after an epic comeback against the Angels on Sunday by scoring 5 runs in the ninth to win 5-3 after there were two outs and no one on base. The Angels and the Astros are going to have a lot to say of who wins the West and wins the second wildcard. The Angels play 11 of their final 20 games against teams ahead of them in the standings. The Astros play 6 with Texas and 4 with the Angels. The Twins only play host to 4 games with the Angels after playing Detroit. After that, they'll be playing 6 with Cleveland and 3 at Detroit and finish with 3 home games against the Royals, who will more than likely be gearing up for the playoffs instead of worrying about regular-season games, although they might be battling with Toronto for the best record in the AL and homefield advantage in a possible ALCS matchup.

This one is going to sting for a while, at least until the next Twins win.

The Twins were on the verge of a very exciting and impressive game and series victory before it all unraveled. The Twins had their best reliever in the game at the right moment and he just didn't have it today. Pitchers have been called effectively wild, but in this game, Trevor May was ineffectively wild. He had a hard time throwing strikes, and once he did, it was hit a long ways by Jed Lowrie (?!)

The Twins will just have to look at this as an opportunity to show how resilient they are. After the Angels shut out the Rangers, the Twins remained just 1 1/2 games back of the last playoff position. Of course, it also meant the Angels are within a game of the Twins. The Twins go from the kettle into the fire now as they go to Kansas City for a three-game series to play the best team in the American League.

It's been a crazy last few weeks as the Twins have gone from nearly out of contention to right in the middle of the wildcard race, mostly on the strength of the bullpen. However, the rotation, which has for the most part been better than expected this season, was becoming a concern with a lot of short, ineffective starts. However, the Twins have now gotten back-to-back terrific starts from Ervin Santana, who's struggled the most, and Tyler Duffey, the Twins' least experienced pitcher that most Twins fans hadn't even heard of prior to this season.

Of course, now the bullpen is once again a concern with Jepsen needing help from Byron Buxton to save Saturday's game and May blowing the lead on Sunday. Meanwhile, All-Star closer Glen Perkins is out with a bad back and showing little signs of improvement.

If I had to complain about something in Sunday's game, it would have been the top of the 7th inning. FSN just put up a graphic showing how Eduardo Escobar had been the Twins' best hitter for the last couple weeks when Escobar attempted to sacrifice bunt against a pitcher he'd already homered against earlier in the game and with the 8 and 9 batters coming up and the slow-footed Trevor Plouffe on second. The Astros got the forceout at third and then Kurt Suzuki and Buxton were retired quickly to end the last chance the Twins had to break the game open. If Escobar had been able to reach base and the Twins were able to extend the inning to bring Aaron Hicks to the plate, it might have been a completely different game. Of course, Hicks hit a leadoff home run the next inning, but the Twins were trailing at that point 5-2.

The other issue was Plouffe was adamant that he was safe at third on the sacrifice attempt because Lowrie didn't have his foot on the base. The Twins apparently decided there wasn't enough video evidence and didn't challenge. However, it was a critical point late in the game. What would be the harm in challenging? If it's overturned, it would be bases loaded and no outs. If not, you just lose your challenge, but at this point in the game, you can still ask for the umps to review a play anyways whether you have a challenge or not. Plus, maybe a long challenge could throw off Dallas Keuchel. It just seemed silly to not challenge, especially with how convinced Plouffe was that he was safe.

Whewwwwwwwwwwwwww!

That sound emanating from downtown Minneapolis on Sunday was one huge sigh of relief following not just a good performance, but a dominant performance from Minnesota Twins starting pitcher Ervin Santana, who pitched 7 shutout innings with 10 strikeouts and no walks.

That sigh no doubt came from Twins manager Paul Molitor and pitching coach Neil Allen, who would be faced with a difficult decision if Santana had another poor outing with Tyler Duffey pitching well and Phil Hughes ready to come off the disabled list pretty soon.

That sigh no doubt also came from the Twins bullpen, who did not have to come into a game before the seventh inning for the first time since August 20.

In fact, that sigh no doubt came from the position players as well as the victory got the Twins to .500 in August, which gave the team just its second nonlosing month of the season. The Twins went 21-7 in May but had losing records in April, June and July.

That sigh also no doubt came from Twins fans as Trevor May got a strikeout to end the game after the Astros came storming back with two outs in the 9th on a long three-run homer and a two-run homer to reduce a 7-run lead to 2, but May made sure that the Astros would not get the tying run to the plate and that closer Glen Perkins would not be forced to come into the game.

But maybe the biggest sigh of relief came from the Twins' front office, who saw Santana finally pitch like the pitcher they thought they were getting when they signed him to the richest free agent contract in franchise history.  Santana's 10 strikeouts were a season high for Twins pitchers, topping the 9 strikeouts done by Kyle Gibson, Phil Hughes and twice by Trevor May, who was the last Twins pitcher to have a 10 K, 0 BB game, on Sept. 14, 2014. That of course was the last time a Twins pitcher had 10 Ks in a game period.

I almost forgot one other sigh of relief, which was the one coming from the emergency responders and medical staff at Target Field once they realized no one had been hit by the screaming line drive hit by Miguel Sano into the left-field stands. A few more of those, and people will be pining for netting placed in front of the outfield stands. Forget about extending it around foul territory.

Just when you think you've seen everything...

I think it's safe to say the Twins have found the smoke and mirrors they seemed to misplace at the end of May. It was just four days ago the Yankees had all but ended the Twins' postseason chances. Now, four wins in Baltimore later, the Twins have vaulted past the O's and the Rays and are now tied with the suddenly reeling Angels just 1 1/2 games behind the Rangers for the second wildcard spot. Plus, the Twins are heading to Tampa to face the Rays, who are a game back of the Twins, for 3 games. The Twins have a chance at their first winning road trip since May 19-24 and have won 3 of their last 4 series, the only series wins they've had since the All-Star break.

The Twins basically did to the Orioles what the Yankees did to the Twins, although the Twins did it in completely different ways. Besides the blowout in the first game, the Twins were the better team in the later innings despite the Orioles generally having a better bullpen. The Orioles only have three losses when leading after 7 innings, and two of those losses came in this series, including Sunday's game.

However, it wasn't like the Twins hit the O's bullpen hard. The Twins tied the game in the ninth on an infield single when the pitcher failed to get over in time on a ground ball to the first baseman. Then came an infield out to advance the runner to second and a two-out ground ball in the hole between shortstop and third base to score the tying run.

The winning rally was the result of two Oriole errors and great hustle by Eduardo Escobar, who went to second base after his slow chopper went under the glove of the shortstop. He then scored when a ground ball went off the third baseman's glove and trickled into the outfield.

In Saturday's game, the Twins used a hit-and-run single, a squeeze bunt to tie the game and a two-out line-drive single to take the lead in the 7th inning. Their only other run of the game was on a roller that snuck through a drawn-in infield.

In Friday's game, the Twins used a sac fly and a pop fly that fell behind a drawn-in infield to score three runs in the eighth inning and win 4-3. The only other run of the game came on a bases loaded walk.

So it wasn't that the Twins were exactly killing the ball in the final three games after scoring 15 runs in the opener. They executed well and took advantage of Orioles mistakes to get just enough runs to win three days in a row.

The real key to the series was the Twins' bullpen. After being just awful against the Yankees, the reliever suddenly could do no wrong. On Sunday, the bullpen pitched 7 1/3 shutout innings with just four hits and two walks allowed and 7 strikeouts. For the series, the bullpen didn't allow a run in 15 2/3 innings. They had 16 Ks with just 5 hits and 4 walks allowed (0.57 WHIP). And this only included one inning from All-Star closer Glen Perkins, who had a couple cortisone shots in his neck after the end of the Yankees series.

What many Twins fans I'm sure were pleased to see was manager Paul Molitor again using his closer in a tied game on the road. This almost never happened under previous manager Ron Gardenhire over 13 seasons. He would inevitably save his closer for a save opportunity that often didn't come because a lesser reliever would lose the game. Of course, Molitor had previously tried using Perkins against the Yankees while Perkins' neck was still bothering him, so he ended up losing the game that was tied. On Sunday, Molitor not only used Kevin Jepsen, who was filling in at closer while Perkins was out, but Perkins himself, who Molitor had previously said he wanted to wait until Tuesday to get Perkins back on the mound. Perkins gave up a couple hits but kept the game tied and ended up the winning pitcher. With just about their entire bullpen used up and not wanting to overuse Casey Fien, Molitor called on starting pitcher Tommy Milone and his sub-90 mph fastball to close out the win. Milone got an assist from Byron Buxton, who made a nice leaping catch at the wall to prevent a leadoff double before Milone buckled down and struck out the next two batters with offspeed pitches, once again proving that having a "proven closer" is overrated.

What is not overrated is how much fun it is to watch Miguel Sano hit. He gave the Twins the early lead on Sunday with a two-run home run in the first inning. It was a rocket of a line drive to right-center field and may have been his most impressive home run to date, considering it was his first home run to the opposite field and the pitcher he hit it off of was nearly untouchable by the Twins after Sano's homer. He also had a double to left in the 11th inning. The Twins only had seven hits and Sano had two of them and they were the only two hit with any authority. If Sano will remember the approach that got him his home run, that could really help him cut down on his strikeouts and help him go from being a Chris Davis-type hitter to a Miguel Cabrera-type hitter.

Don't stop me if you've heard this before.

The Twins got good pitching from a starter they didn't know what to expect from then got shutout relief from beleagured setup men to get to Perkins. They scored a couple runs early from the bottom of the order then added a couple runs in the eighth to give Glen Perkins a nice cushion to work with in a 4-1 win.

No, I'm not recapping Saturday's game. I guess the Twins liked the formula from Saturday so much, they decided to use it on Sunday against the Indians.

This time, it was Tommy Milone in his first start since coming off the DL. He was limited to about 75-80 pitches and I'm sure there had to be some concern that he might reinjure himself since it's difficult to simulate game situations in the bullpen. Can't really complain about 1 run in 5 innings, but he was facing an Indians lineup that has struggled against lefties and has been decimated by injuries and trades. Milone ended up walking 3 and striking out just 3, although he did have twice as many ground balls as fly balls, which is unusual for him, and only two line drives against. His final pitch was his most important as he struck out Yan Gomes with the bases loaded to end the fifth inning and preserve a 2-1 lead.

With only 5 innings from the starter, manager Paul Molitor had to use one extra reliever to bridge the gap to Perkins. He decided to start with the beleagured Brian Duensing before going back to Casey Fien and Kevin Jepsen. They combined for three scoreless innings with just two hits allowed. Jepsen struck out Ryan Rayburn to the 8th with the tying run in scoring position.

The offense had the tough task of facing red-hot Carlos Carrasco. Suzuki was Kurt "Klutch" once again with a two-out, two-strike, two-run single in the second inning to plate the Twins' only runs against Carrasco in 7 innings. A sac fly in the top of the inning had given the Indians the lead, which is an important fact since Carrasco had been 10-0 when given any type of lead. Of course, he had never won 1-0 this year and the first inning is by far his worst this season.

Trevor Plouffe then added a home run in the eighth off a reliever to make it 3-1. Eddie Rosario missed a home run by inches off the high wall in right center and settled for a triple after it took a funny bounce. Rosario might have legged out a home run if he had run hard out of the box. It didn't matter, since Eduardo Nunez laid down a perfect bunt for an RBI single to make it 4-1. On replay, it's hard to tell if it was a squeeze or not. If it was, Rosario got a late break from third. It might have just been a safety squeeze.

Nunez also legged out a double earlier in the game to set up Suzuki's two-run single. He also had a nice play in the hole at shortstop. Nunez always had a bad reputation defensively with the Yankees and the metrics bear that out, but he's been average or a little better in limited playing time in Minnesota. He now has a .705 OPS on the season, which is nothing to complain about from a shortstop if you can get average defense from him

So whoever had the Twins collapse starting at the All-Star break, looks like they were correct.

The good news is the Twins avoided giving up 9 or more runs for the fifth straight game. The last time they did it in four straight was in 2003. That year, they ended the streak also with allowing 8 runs. This means, of course, they've gone through an entire turn of the rotation while allowing at least 8 runs. Yikes.

Twins are now under .500 and only a game ahead of the Tigers (two in the loss column) and are 4 games back of the second wildcard with four teams to leapfrog.

That's not a good place to be. Not impossible but not likely enough to think a minor trade or two is worth going for. It's time for the Twins to start looking to the future. It's time to call clear room on the roster for Jose Berrios, Byron Buxton and Max Kepler. I want to see the future to give me more hope that a real pennant race will be around the corner very soon.

Regardless, at least the rest of the season I'll be able to watch Sano, Rosario and Hicks hit, although I'm still concerned about Rosario's strikeout to walk ratio. It has been very Santana like, and we know how well that went this year.

Well, so much for any positive vibes about the bullpen.

New acquisition (and supposed upgrade) Kevin Jepsen takes the loss after walking the first two batters he faces as a Twin. He did at least strike out red-hot Nelson Cruz, who had homered off of slumping Glen Perkins in the 9th inning. Duensing then came in and gave up a go-ahead double on the one competitive pitch he threw (he intentionally walked the next batter to reload the bases before exiting). Casey Fien then gave up a two-run single to pretty much eliminate any hope of a comeback.

The one interesting development was the fact that Trevor May was used before Jepsen in this game. May pitched the 10th inning even though he had pitched the previous day and Jepsen had pitched only once in the previous 9 days. Prior to the game, the Twins put Tommy Milone on the DL with an elbow strain and recalled Tyler Duffey to take Milone's spot in the rotation. May has been in the bullpen since Ervin Santana returned from his suspension at the beginning of July and hasn't pitched more than 2 innings at a time. Twins management said that they expect Milone to be back quickly, hopefully when the 15 days are up (insert TJ joke here) and chose to go with Duffey over May because May wasn't stretched out.

That makes sense but I think May's effectiveness as a reliever also played a part. The Twins simply can't afford to take him out of the bullpen. May did have a bad outing when he gave up 3 runs to the A's on July 19, but since then he's allowed just 1 run in 6 outings with 8 Ks and 2 BBs (1 intentional). He's also shown increased velocity, much like Perkins did when he transitioned to the bullpen. In this game, May did allow a 1-out double but also had two strikeouts in a scoreless inning.

The rest of the bullpen's woes overshadowed a great pitchers' duel between Hisashi "I Love MN!" Iwakuma and Mike Pelfrey. Pelfrey only had 3 strikeouts, but the Mariners continually pounded his sinker into the grass for 16 outs in 8 scoreless innings. The Mariners didn't even have a runner in scoring position against Pelfrey.

The game might not have gone to extras if it hadn't been for Perkins grooving a fastball on 3-0 to Cruz instead of just walking him. I blame that as much on manager Paul Molitor as Perkins. And yes, I realize the irony of criticizing Molitor for not walking the go-ahead run when the Twins won the day before because the M's had done the exact-same thing. However, there were some important differences. For one, the Mariners didn't even throw one pitch to Eddie Rosario. Perkins fell behind 3-0. At that point, you might as well walk him. It seemed like he was pitching around Cruz anyways. Also, Cruz is much slower than Rosario. The Mariners might have even pinch run for him and getting Cruz out of the game when it is still tied would be no small thing.

The game did get to extras thanks to Brian "Mr. Clutch" Dozier, who hit maybe his most improbable home run this season since it came off of Iwakuma, who had previously never given up an earned run to the Twins in over 40 innings.

Oh well. At least the Twins split the series. This was the first series since the All-Star break that the Twins did not lose. Now it is off to Toronto for perhaps the most important series of the season. The Twins have talked about their resiliency. Well, they need to show some of that real soon or they could be out of this playoff chase very quickly.