Colon vs. Gonzalez
DAY GAME ALERT! GAME IN PROGRESS!
So yeah, not much to say today. Buxton is hurt and that is bad for the Twins and bad for baseball.
Tag Archives: Twins
Game 24 — Athletics at Twins
It’s May and the Twins have a winning record. Miguel Sano had a great first month and has been decent in the field (man what a rifle for an arm at third base). Polanco doing well, Buxton maybe showing some signs of life at the plate, serviceable pitching… all portend to at least some hope that we will continue to see entertaining, hopeful baseball into the Summer.
Ervin Santana has been lights out this year and brings his 0.77 ERA to tonight’s game against the Athletics and the 2017 debut of Sonny Gray. Game at 7:10p
2016 Game #62: Scarlet Hosiery (36-25) at Matched Pairs (18-43)
First Pitch 1:10 p.m.
Rick Porcello (7-2, 4.04 ERA, 68 K, 1.084 WHIP)
Pat Dean (1-2, 4.75 ERA, 22K, 1.484 WHIP)
The Curse of 2016 continues for the home team with news that Phil Hughes actually suffered a compression fracture of the femur from a wicked line drive smash to the knee and not just a bruise and will be out six to eight weeks. Trevor May was also sent to the DL with a sore back, and Glen Perkins was moved to the 60-day DL after experiencing very slow progress in his rehab.
I've never in my day seen a team as snake-bit as this year's constitution of the Twins. I don't even know what to say about this team and the size of the hole they continue to dig anymore. We have 100 games left after today, and we're on pace to go 47-115 for the season, according to my Indiana algebra. For perspective, the worst season in franchise history belongs to the 1904 Washington Senators, who lost 113 games out of 157 for a .252 winning percentage. The worst Twins record on record was the 102 loss team of 1982. I guess the good news this year is we're only slightly under-performing our Pythagorean of 20-41.
The Red Sox are going for a sweep today in what will be David Ortiz's last game against the Twins. If there's any more appropriately symbolic indictment of the perennial mismanagement of the Minnesota Twins, it's David Ortiz and his career numbers (.286/.379/.551/.931/141 OPS+) standing at the plate today against a ragtag collection of Twins players struggling to prevent an historically bad losing record.
Rick Porcello on the hill for Boston against left-hander Pat Dean for the Twins. Normally I'd say "Play ball," but...
Fuck it, Dude. Let's go bowling.
Game 16: Minnesota at Milwaukee
Remember when we were joakingly discussing the possibility of Minnesota's first win coming against the Brewers because they were the first "obviously inferior" opponent on the schedule? Good times.
A win today salvages a season-split with the Sconnie's and would give the Twins their first road win of the season. It would also get them to 5 wins - the same number of W's as the Astros & Yankees (the other divisions' last-place teams).
R. Nolasco (0-0, 3.21 ERA, 8:2 K:BB, 118 ERA+, 3.25 FIP, 1.000 WHIP - 14 innings)
-v-
T. Jungmann (0-2, 9.00 ERA, 9:4 K:BB, 47 ERA+, 4.81 FIP, 1.615 WHIP - 13 innings)
.500 ball at home and .000 on the road is no way to go through a season - let's break through that barrier fellas!
Game 111: Twins @ Cleveland
So, now they're back to using position players as pitchers? But what about that nine man bullpen? In 20 1/3 innings over the last four games, 11 relievers have combined to allow 15 runs. After a stretch of games where the pitching was good enough to win some but the offense was nowhere to be seen, we've now had stretch where the pitching, both starters and relievers, are regressing while the offense is ... well ... improving.
Hopefully today, Phil Hughes (10-7, 4.14 ERA, 1.25 WHIP) is able to keep the ball in the park, pitch deep into the game, and get some offense from his offense.
His offense will be facing the reigning Cy Young winner in Corey Kluber (6-12, 3.60 ERA, 1.12 WHIP) who with 32 BB's 176 K's over 162.2 innings this year will, in all likelihood, strike out about a dozen Twins hitters today. In his last four games against Minnesota, he's 2-1 with a 2.59 ERA with 37 K's over 31 1/3 innings. Perhaps interspersed with those strikeouts will be some hits...hopefully?
2014 Game 68: Twins at Red Sox
RIP, Tony Gwynn. I quit smoking several years ago, and I quit chew about five minutes after my first dip of Skoal. Play ball!
Twins Lineup:
Santana, SS
Dozier, 2B
Mauer, 1B
Willingham, LF
Morales, DH
Arcia, RF
Suzuki, C
Escobar, 3B
Fuld, CF
Red Sox Lineup:
Holt, LF
Bogaerts, 3B
Pedroia, 2B
Ortiz, DH
Napoli, 1B
Nava, RF
Drew, SS
Pierzynski, C
Bradley, CF
On the Mound:
Rubby De La Rosa (1-2, 3.93 ERA)
Kevin Correia (3-7, 5.60 ERA)
Game 63: The Minnesotas vs. The Torontoes
Correia (2-7, 6.11 ERA) vs. Happ (5-2, 4.12 ERA)
Time to get a winning streak starter, Mr. Correia. Somehow. That craptacular AL Central title isn't going to wait around all season. At least, I think it won't even though the Tigers seem to be doing their best to leave it on the platter.
My time in Manchester is finished and we've moved to an area that looks, basically, like every American mall area ever. Its pretty awful. There's still some real ale to be found, but its all in what seem to compare to TGI Fridays or the like. Fortunately, I won't have time to do anything, anyway, since we're here to conduct a trial this week. I did manage to introduce the Scottish sales guy that I'm with to Bengali Tiger last night, though and the same bar had this on cask as well.
2014 Game 62: Twins at Bleu Jays
Start time at 6:07 p.m.? That better be a cash grab first pitch time like the Pale Hosers 7:11 sponsorship deal, because otherwise it makes no sense. Unless it's a metric thing...
When I was about 8 or 9, my mom dropped me off at the park half an hour early for baseball practice. It was hot and I was tired so I sat down under a tree to chill in the shade for awhile. Turned out I picked a tree with a blue jay nest full of chicks and one aggressive mother of a momma. She was able to dive bomb me half a dozen times before I could clear the area, and I'm sure I looked pretty foolish running from a bird. I've been predisposed to dislike blue jays in any form ever since.
On The Hill:
Nolasco (4-5, 5.65) vs. R.A. Dickey (6-4, 4.25)
Ricky Nolasco gets the start for the Twins tonight while former Twin/Met/Mariner/Ranger R.A Dickey gets the ball for the Jays. The Twins bested Toronto in an early April series by taking both ends of a doubleheader made necessary by a weather postponement. Dickey pitched one of those games, but he gave up five runs on seven hits and five walks in 4 1/3 innings for his shortest outing of the season, that one against Kyle Gibson.
The Blue Jays had won their last six series before losing their weekend series to the Cardinals. The Twins are still trying to get back to .500 after splitting a 4-game home-and-away series with Milwaukee and dropping their weekend series to Houston. Enough, already. Play ball!
2014 Game 55: Two Identical Things at Lager Makers
Tonight commences an oddity in Milwaukee, the opener of a four-game, home-and-away series to mark the long-ago rivalry that existed when the Twins and Brewers were in the same league but that MLB likes to keep alive for the sake of marketing. I can appreciate that. The Twins send Kyle Gibson (4-4, 4.81) to the mound tonight to face off with Matt Garza (2-4, 4.84). And of course we have the bonus of Carlos Gomez in the game tonight. Fortunately for us, Gomez won't be out for any type of revenge, even the kind that's served cold. In fact, it seems Gomez really enjoyed his time in the Twin Cities. "I don't have any hard feelings with Minnesota," says Gomez. "I'm always watching highlights from Minnesota, because they took care of me well and had beautiful fans."
I'm sure he's talking about us, citizens. Play ball!
Game 150: Two of the Same Thing vs. Colorless Socks
Big Pelf (5-12, 5.31 ERA) vs. Quintana (7-6, 3.56 ERA)
I check the standings when I remember to prepare a game log to figure out which game number to put in the title, and its been an increasingly depressing activity this season. Fortunately, there's the Pale Hosers manning the bottom of this division. I was contemplating putting up the magic number for the Twins to hold off the Sox to avoid finishing last in the AL Central, but there's nothing magic about it so I decided not to.
Anywho, I presume Mauer is being shut down for the rest of the season meaning the lineup is still a diminished Willingham and a bunch of "young" guys, so that's fun.
What is actually fun is the reaction down here to the Badgers losing this weekend. People take this crap way too seriously around here and get really deluded about things. Its both humorous and insufferable at the same time.