Tag Archives: Detroit Tigers

2012 Twins Game Log

2012 Game 115: Panthera Tigris v. Gemini

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First Pitch - 7:10 p.m.
Television - FSN
Lineups

No, we don't really have the Tigers by the tail, we're 11.5 games behind them in the standings and from here you can't even see their tail, although you can catch a faint whiff of what's directly beneath it. The Detroit Tigers have been disappointing their fans lately by struggling to gain ground on the division leader, losing four of their last ten games. The Twins, on other hand, have been adding glory to their franchise history by proving triumphant in five of their most recent ten contests and remain poised to surpass both the Kansas City Royals and the Cleveland Indians before the season draws to a close.

With this season well on the downhill side, the non-waiver trade deadline in the rearview and a few weeks to go before September call-ups, there's not much for Twins fans to get excited about except playing spoiler, the face-crushing demotion of Nishi, and the glorious return to the lineup of Trevor Plouffe!. Even the chance to play spoiler to the contending Tigers is tempered by the realization that beating them does nothing except improve the chances of the White Sox winning the division. Boo dat.

On The Hill:
Anibal Sanchez - Who cares about his stats, he's named Anibal. This guy is one vowel substitution away from losing a testicle.
Samuel Deduno - His middle name is Lake. I got nothing.

Neither of these pitchers has a record against their opponent, so who knows what to expect. But I would be pretty surprised to see an old-fashioned pitchers' duel tonight.

Play ball!

2012 Twins Game Recaps, Minnesota Twins, MLB

Game 80 Recap: Minnesota Twins 6, Detroit Tigers 4

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after jacking donger after donger over the weekend, the twins squeak by the tigers with a mere 13 singles (leaving 12 on base) for their fourth win in a row, and gardy's 900th total. the bullpen held up, though not without creating some drama, and the twins denied the tigers' 8th attempt at a .500 record.

the twins are now, by virtue of teh suck of the central, only eight games back from the sox. i have a very bad feeling that they'll go on their standard july tear and hold on to all of their chips at the deadline in a foolish and misguided attempt at contention, and then crash back to earth in august empty-handed. but that's just my opinion.

MLB.com
B-R
fangraphs

2012 Twins Game Recaps

Game 38 Recap: A Hot Day in Detroit

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The sun was shining, big and bright and unfamiliar. I hadn't been outside before sunset in God knows how long. I never thought I'd come to miss nighttime, when the darkness wraps around you like a cold, wet towel. But there I was, yearning for it. Never saw myself as the yearning type. Not part of the job, generally.  I'm a private eye. The name's Walters. P.J. if you buy me a drink first.

I was in Detroit at the behest of some real down-and-outs, a couple of hard-luck Minnesotans with little more than a sob-story to their name. Not that they told me their names. Just call us The Twins, they said when they came calling. Let's keep this anonymous. Somebody took our wins. Bring them back to us. I had half a mind to tell them off, but the other half saw the stack of bills they seemed to be offering. They played at being hard-up,  but it turned out they were secretly living large. I wasn't sure what the game was, but the money spoke for itself. And the misery on their faces was as plain as Norwegian cooking. Whatever else, they needed those wins back, badly.

Continue reading Game 38 Recap: A Hot Day in Detroit →

2012 Twins Game Log

Game 37! We all rejoice!

244 Comments

Twins visiting Detroit starting with tonight's game. 610 CDT first pitch.

##Pitchers

MIN: Blackburn (1-4 | 7.18 ERA | 5.83 FIP | 4.49 xFIP | -0.2 fWAR | 4.88 K/9 | 1.55 K/BB)
 DET: Porcello (3-3 | 5.18 ERA | 4.54 FIP | 3.91 xFIP | +0.3 fWAR | 5.18 K/9 | 2.67 K/BB)

Hey look another Wednesday game! You know what's fun? Watching baseball. Even this form of Twins baseball is better than the off season. Right?

Count me out of those asking for changes. Well sweeping organizational changes anyway. I don't think most of us thought the 2012 Twins would be a great team. Hell a lot of us thought they wouldn't be any good. Unfortunately, they've managed to pretty much undershoot anyones worst expectations so far. 10-26 is awful. I don't think this team is really that bad. The offense will come back again. The pitching will level out. Twins will not end up with a .277 winning percentage. The Twins still get to play in the AL Central last I checked.

Porcello is a hittable righty. One would hope that the Twins will take advantage; oh and there is that whole Detroit has a hilariously defensive team. At least killing worms might work tonight. He does rely on a sinker, but he's had some trouble getting it to sink lately. No Adjustments!

Blackburn needs a beard. And an eye patch. But at least he's not Marquis. If he can keep it in the park, he should be fine.

Note: The term "Market Inefficiency" is hereby banned from the game thread. They call it the Dismal "Science" for a reason.

##Lineups

###Twins

1. Span 8
2. Dozier 6
3. Mauer DH
4. Willingham 7
5. Morneau 3
6. Doumit 2
7. Plouffe 9
8. Casilla 4
9. Carroll 5

###Tiggers

1. Austin Jackson, CF
2. Andy Dirks, LF
3. Miguel Cabrera, 3B
4. Prince Fielder, 1B
5. Delmon Young, DH
6. Alex Avila, C
7. Ryan Raburn, 2B
8. Brennan Boesch, RF
9. Ramon Santiago, SS

#GO TWINS!

2011 Twins Game Recaps, Minnesota Twins

2011 Game 131 Recap: Tigers 8, Twins 1

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Box Score
Fangraphs

Weather: 86 degrees, clear
Wind: 12 mph, out to RF
Time: 2:55
Attendance: 38,918

I woke up with a head pounding like Niagara Falls and a mouth as dry as Death Valley. An empty bourbon bottle lay on its side on the table, another soldier that gave its last full measure. The dame was long gone, more than a month ago now. One night while we were having a few laughs she slipped me a mickey and took a powder, taking the mojo and my wallet with her. Yeah, she played me for a real sap, and I let her. The name's Twayn. I'm a shamus.

I thought I had her angle figured, see? It seemed clear that the dame was setting me up for a double cross. It was the smart move, after all. Hire me to find the mojo for her, then stick a shiv in my back and make tracks. There's no shortage of teams looking for some mojo this time of year, and they're willing to shell out a stack of semollians to get it. Some of them aren't above using a dame to get what they want. I was onto her from the start, but I let my guard down that night. Maybe it was the way her eyes shined in the moonlight, or the sob story she poured out along with the whiskey.

I've heard a lot of sob stories in my day. They mostly went along with the sound of a tinny piano playing in the parlor downstairs. "Mister, I met a man once when I was young," it always began. This one wasn't much different. So I let her set the hook and start reeling. I just didn't figure she'd make her move quite so fast. Now the mojo is gone for good, and things have been going south ever since she flew the coop. Bad pitching, bad hitting, bad defense -- it's pretty much been the perfect storm of horseshit baseball for the team. And to top if off, Jim Thome got shanghaied to Cleveland.

I still watch the games most nights. Call it my self-imposed penance for letting the mojo get away, and since the boys downtown pulled my license I don't have a lot to do these days. But it doesn't take a detective to see the signs of a team that's lost its mojo. A 5-18 record in August, the worst in the major leagues. Six losses in a row, and no more than a run scored in any of them. Hell, the boys haven't scored more than a run in 13 of their last 23 games. And for the first time in franchise history, they've lost six straight games at home.

I pull the covers back and drag my sad sack of bones out of the bed, run fingers through my hair and head for the shower. There's an afternoon game today, and I need to get to the liquor store before first pitch. Maybe I should just get a case this time. I have a hunch it's going to be a long September.

2011 Twins Game Logs

2011 Game Logs: Game 122 Minnesota Non-Delmons @ Detroit _elm_ns

124 Comments

Nick Blackburn

@

Justin Verlander

Alright, you guys are going to have to bare with me for a little bit here. I am going to try to crunch some numbers and see if I can find a way for the Twins to make up the 10.5 game deficit currently between them and first place.

While I understand the caveats of a small sample size, it is difficult to argue with cold hard numbers. One such case of ignoring sample sizes has to be the result of the Twins scoring 9 runs in every single game that Delmon Young has never been a member of the Twins this season.  Conversely, the Twins have allowed only 6 runs in each and every game played since they traded Delmon. Considering the Tigers had a team ERA of 4.25 before the Delmon trade, I feel comfortable saying the Delmon has made the Tigers 1.75 runs worse per game.

So, at this point the next natural thing to do was to go through the previous 121 games, see how many games the Twins would have won if they scored 9 runs and allowed 1.75 less runs the scoreboard reflected. I will then take that winning percentage, apply it to the rest of the season and see if it puts the Twins in position to win the Central.

This would put the Twins record at 112-9. Over the course of a full season that translates of a winning percentage of .925. This would give the Twins 37.02 wins over the remaining 40 games. We will round this down to 37 wins (to be realistic), putting the Twins final tally over the last 40 games at 37-3.

Assuming all of this elm'n-less math to be true this will put the Twins at 90 wins for the 2011 campaign. Not too shabby. Now how about the other teams? Seeing as how the Tigers are still yet to win a game while employing Delmon I think it is safe to figure they will continue to lose every game the rest of the season.  With the Twins winning 90 the Tigers will be pretty far behind with only 64 wins.

As for the other teams the Twins have to pass, pfft, it is AMR's White Sox and the lowly Indians. Neither of those teams should prove too much trouble as the Twins cruise to their 7th division title in 10 years.

Man, this is going to be an awesome couple of months.