No game thread in sight, so I'll start one. 

 

The Twins are 4-2 after a 10-4 defeat in the rain last night. We saw bad Odo after good Odo pitched the second game of the season. Jorge Polanco went 5-5 and hit for the cycle in his first four ABs. Kepler and Polanco homered, now giving the Twins 3 homers on the year.

 

The pitching staff walked eight and the game was brutal to watch, but today is another day!

 

Lineups: Twins

 

Kepler RF

Astudillo C

Polanco SS

Cron 1B

Cave LF

Schoop 2B

Adrianza 3B

Buxton CF

Pineda P

 

Phillies

 

McCutchen LF

Segura SS

Harper RF

Hoskins 1B

Herrera  CF

Hernandez  2B

Knapp C

Franco  3B

Arrieta P

Oh no, we're playing without a centerfielder! Fire Baldelli!

Tonight my son bashbury should be in attendance at Citizens Bank Park. I'm looking forward to game highlights from him at some point.

 

/ edit - perhaps he'll have some insights on how they get along with a 2-man outfield.

OK, smart guys, I've added a ninth batter to the lineup. Sorry, for some reason, I couldn't copy and paste. Doing things manually is hard!

OK, smart guys, I've added a ninth batter to the lineup. Sorry, for some reason, I couldn't copy and paste. Doing things manually is hard!

This massively decreases my interest in tonight's game. I thought our Analytics room had achieved some kind of breakthrough in optimal efficiency or something.

No Gonzales and Castro!

We've got a chance!

 

No Gonzales and Castro!
We've got a chance!

 

No Rosario nor Cruz either. We've got Adrianza and Cave in there. Would this be considered a "getaway day" lineup?

 

Interesting seeing Astudillo in the 2 spot and Polanco hitting 3rd. A sign of things to come?

No Rosario nor Cruz either. We've got Adrianza and Cave in there. Would this be considered a "getaway day" lineup?

 

Interesting seeing Astudillo in the 2 spot and Polanco hitting 3rd. A sign of things to come?

Rosie needs to watch a game from the bench right now. I don't know what's going in with him, I won't be surprised if we find out later that he has something else on his mind right now.

 

If you take out Gonzalez's outlier 2017 season, his career offensive numbers don't look much different than Adrianza's, so I'm not ready to claim that's a downgrade just yet.

Seeing the NL park lineups brings a question to my mind--how many games were played last year with only nine players playing for one team? Since we have so few complete games, I would guess the number is very low. I wonder if we will have any this year? 

2 pitches, 2 outs. Seriously? Have they not talked about this yet?

Nice work getting out of a jam after giving up the leadoff double by Pineda there.

2 pitches, 2 outs. Seriously? Have they not talked about this yet?

I have less problem with that in this new era of bullpen management.

Starters are pulled as much based on times through the order as they are pitch count. If the first pitch is a good one, go for it.

Pineda did a good job pitching out of that - maybe that can jump start our offense.

Pineda looks as good as Odorizzi did bad.

Bunt or steal?

Steal.

Button creates a run. Great job.

Speed!

Oh, and Power!

Buxton!

 

Kepler!

Woooooooooo!!!

Kepler is finding his swing!

Wooooooooo again!!!

Tortuga!!

And more power!

Holy smokes! Astudillo!

Astudillo takes Arrieta yard — can’t get enough

LA TORTUGA

Speed, power, boos, power, boos x 2.

Glad I put Tortuga in my fantasy team’s lineup for Posey today!!