Twins early optimism goes up in smoke

When Taylor Rogers took the mound in the 9th inning last Thursdsy afternoon in Pittsburgh, the Twins were 3 outs away from winning their 7th straight game, which would have pushed them to a league best 11-2 mark. 

What a difference 1 inning and 1 weekend can make. 

The Twins fine start and good vibes that came with it have been quickly obliterated.

Rogers of course blew that save, but hey, it's just 1 tough loss. And hey, we got the lowly Royals ahead. In fact, we have 2 solid weeks ahead of nothing but the Royals and Brewers. The Twins should be able to fatten up their record, and grow their AL central.lead.

Nope. Instead the Twins played their worst regular season series of the Rocco Baldelli era. The Royals swept the lifeless, largely incompetent Twins, and have given every sane fan every reason possible to slam the panic button. Yes already. Hey, it's not 16 games into 162. We're already into the 2nd quarter of the season.

Even before this weekend disaster there were concerns about the Twins offense. We haven't been seeing consistency from.anyone other than Nelson Cruz. But wins mask all, and they had been pitching just well enough and getting just enough runs to get by. 

But not anymore. The Twins bats were shockingly inept all weekend. They can't score runs if the ball is not going over the fence. And the ball isn't going over the fence, at least not like it was last year. Relying so heavily on homeruns has already been proven a strategy destined to break your heart. But since leaving Chicago 3 games into the season the Twins hitters are in a complete feast or famine mode.

They can't string hits together at all. They're having bad at bats constantly, swinging through the hittable pitches, and striking out on slop. They can't stop hitting directly into the shifts. Cruz, Polanco, Kepler, Gonzalez, and a recently resurgent Buxton are largely pulling their weight. But it's a disaster everywhere else. 

Miguel Sano, look, I know he had to miss most of summer training, but my god, he's a veteran player now who just signed his first big contract. He should not ever be back to looking like the same lost hitter who had to be demoted to the low minors 2 years ago.

Eddie Rosario is hitting the ball weakly, if he ever hits it at all. Luis Arraez is having a major sophomore slump. Josh Donaldson hit the IL damn near immediately, so who knows if he will even really contribute this year. And worst of all, Mitch Garver looks like he completely forgot how to play baseball. Is the book simply out on him? He is awful, yet Rocco still bats him leadoff often. Garver offers nothing defensively, so if he can't hit he's of no use.

The Twins starting rotation still COULD be a strength, but the problems there aren't going away. Hill and Bailey each gave them one good start then were hurt. Jake Odorizzi finally made his 1st start of the year in KC but he looked awful, so who knows when he will be a reliable contributor, or how many games will be lost waiting for that to happen. 

And today we saw again that Jose Berrios just is not what we.need him to be. You lose 3 straight games, you need Berrios to step up and be if not the ace, just be a stopper. End the losing streak. Instead Berrios struggled mightily to even get into the 6th. He put them in a 2-0 hole right away (not totally his fault, his defense offered no help), gave KC the lead right back after the Twins tied it up, and gave up a moonshot homerun for good measure. Not good enough, Jose.

It was such an awful series. Bad hitting. Pitchers laboring to get outs. Bad fielding. And Baldelli was awful too. Maybe some of this could be chalked up to.simple bad.luck, but every decision he has made going back to that 9th inning in Pittsburgh has been the wrong one. 

If he plays the shift, KC beat it. If he brings the infield in, it's wrong. If he keeps them back, it's wrong. 

And worst of all is his weird insistence to not use his bullpen big guns. 

The biggest offense was the Saturday game. The Twins bats have their one crooked number of the weekend to go up 4-2. Odorizzi is out. The #1 thing you need now is to put up a zero, to hold that lead and get the bats back out their to hopefully keep momentum going. And what does Baldelli do? He puts in Lewis Thorpe, who immediately gives up a single, then a homerun. Tie game again just like that. Then Stashak comes in and gives up another 2 homeruns and 4 runs total, in a blink. A 4-2 lead becomes an 8-4 deficit within about 20 pitches. Game over basically. I don't understand the refusal to use the best bullpen arms. In a series that was close, or at least within striking distance the whole way, Baldelli gave just 1 appearance to a top 5 reliever (Clippard on Sunday). Trevor May hasn't pitched in nearly a week. I don't get it.

I can't go for the apologist takes on this. The Twins are playing very badly right now across the board, and a lot of what's ailing them is not likely to simply go away, as I heard things do (😏). And it's not stuff you can wait out for a few weeks. In a few weeks the season will be half over.

Right now the Twins look like a team that may make the playoffs, but will have no chance once they get there.