Game Thread Twins @ Red Stockings 12:35pm CDT 4/17/2022 AD

[Aggies7]

Twins have now played 9 games and had 5 or fewer hits in SIX of them. Let’s start there for heavy criticism 

[Steve71]

This team is circling the toilet again in April.  I don't know if it is talent, coaching, motivation or what, but someone needs to light a fire under this squad or start tearing it all down.  It is totally disheartening to be so non-competitive.

The Dodgers made us look like a minor league squad.  The Red Sox are clearly better, too. This is simply lousy baseball to watch.

I would trade Sano to Colorado for a bag of balls, bring up players from AAA that want to play hard, and take our lumps getting some young players some big league experience.

[twins_89]

I always thought there would be a big Twins sell off this season, but the way the team is looking that could start in May rather than July.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

10 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

All right, top of the ninth.

 

"In play, runs, runs and more friggin' runs" please.

'Twas not to be...

[LaBombo]

3 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

DAMMIT I wish I'd have come up with that one.

Just a lucky one-timer off the assist.  It's a miracle I was even awake after eating so much Easter ham, which it turns out was actually turkey this year.  Free range organic turkey too, which has even more of that sleep-inducing stuff, terspi... tippy... better google it... okay, it's tryptophazzzzzzzzzzz.

[CRF]

Wasted a nice start by Ober because we can't hit our way out of a piece of tissue paper, and then the stellar pen comes in and throws gas all over the friggin place. DAMN...this is depressing. 

[jun]

I think we have seen enough of Thielbar and Stashak. They need to go. FO should have brought in another good reliever along with Rogers. In reality this bullpen is probably much worse than the bullpen last year. This is going to be another long long season as I predicted before the season started.

[LaBombo]

The B-52's were right:  The Staaay-shack is a little old place where foes' bats get much better...

[LVTwinsfan]

51 minutes ago, Aggies7 said:

He’s far down the list of problems at this point

It all adds up

[HokieRif]

I’m already regretting paying for the full year of MLB tv. If the offense can’t get it together soon, and consistently, we are looking at 100+ losses this season. 

[LVTwinsfan]

53 minutes ago, Aggies7 said:

Twins have now played 9 games and had 5 or fewer hits in SIX of them. Let’s start there for heavy criticism 

Plenty places to start and plenty criticism to go around. For one thing the Twins offense will fix itself. The bullpen won’t, the defense could but who knows. 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

10 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

All right, top of the ninth.

 

"In play, runs, runs and more friggin' runs" please.

'Twas not to be...

[Aggies7]

9 minutes ago, LVTwinsfan said:

Plenty places to start and plenty criticism to go around. For one thing the Twins offense will fix itself. The bullpen won’t, the defense could but who knows. 

How can you be sure the offense will fix itself? Especially with buxton already injured. Still too many auto outs to be sure of that. You’d expect Correa to get it together, but what if he doesn’t?

[sampleSizeOfOne]

13 minutes ago, sampleSizeOfOne said:

'Twas not to be...

Did i double post something by accident?

 

Sorry.

[LA VIkes Fan]

6 minutes ago, Aggies7 said:

How can you be sure the offense will fix itself? Especially with buxton already injured. Still too many auto outs to be sure of that. You’d expect Correa to get it together, but what if he doesn’t?

I agree. How is this offense going to fix itself? Let's look. Arraez, Urshela and Sanchez are doing about what one would expect. Should be hitting 1/2, 6 and 8. Correa and Polanco should get better and give us a 2 and 3 hitter, with Buxton as the 1/2 with Arraez. That's it. That's all we got. Sano is a streaky guy, hits 7th or 8th on a good team. Kepler can't hit and hasn't hit since 2019, should be hitting 8th or 9th and is probably the 4th OF on a good team. Same for Jeffers, back up catcher. The other guys?  Kiriloff is out, probably for a good while and wasn't hitting before. Larnach and/or Gordon? Who knows? I'd be thrilled if Laranch hit .250 with 15 HRs and if Gordon hit .260. Fine for the back end of an order, but not the middle. 

This offense won't fix itself because it doesn't have the talent to fix itself. We have no #4 or #5 hitter, only one high OBP player and he doesn't run well, and put out 3-4 SO machines every game. It's not like we have good quality hitters who are slumping other than Correa and Polanco. We have a middle of the pack offense at best WITH Buxton, Correa and Polanco playing every day and producing the way they can produce. Without that, we have what you saw the last 2 days. Bottom third offense that can't handle good pitching. 

[LVTwinsfan]

35 minutes ago, Aggies7 said:

How can you be sure the offense will fix itself? Especially with buxton already injured. Still too many auto outs to be sure of that. You’d expect Correa to get it together, but what if he doesn’t?

What if he doesn’t? Let’s talk about that in June, Aprils a bit early

[Aggies7]

20 minutes ago, LA VIkes Fan said:

I agree. How is this offense going to fix itself? Let's look. Arraez, Urshela and Sanchez are doing about what one would expect. Should be hitting 1/2, 6 and 8. Correa and Polanco should get better and give us a 2 and 3 hitter, with Buxton as the 1/2 with Arraez. That's it. That's all we got. Sano is a streaky guy, hits 7th or 8th on a good team. Kepler can't hit and hasn't hit since 2019, should be hitting 8th or 9th and is probably the 4th OF on a good team. Same for Jeffers, back up catcher. The other guys?  Kiriloff is out, probably for a good while and wasn't hitting before. Larnach and/or Gordon? Who knows? I'd be thrilled if Laranch hit .250 with 15 HRs and if Gordon hit .260. Fine for the back end of an order, but not the middle. 

This offense won't fix itself because it doesn't have the talent to fix itself. We have no #4 or #5 hitter, only one high OBP player and he doesn't run well, and put out 3-4 SO machines every game. It's not like we have good quality hitters who are slumping other than Correa and Polanco. We have a middle of the pack offense at best WITH Buxton, Correa and Polanco playing every day and producing the way they can produce. Without that, we have what you saw the last 2 days. Bottom third offense that can't handle good pitching. 

Just simply too many auto outs. Kepler falling off the cliff offensively has been killing this team. Sano is streaky but his bad streaks are far more frequent. Kiriloff, who knows. Nagging hand injury that isn’t getting better. Jeffers, blah. No buxton in the lineup and you’re going to struggle tremendously 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

3 hours ago, USAFChief said:

Stallone, Van Damme, and Schwarzenegger are discussing a new action movie, based on classical composers.

"I'll be Mozart," says Van Damme

"I'll be Beethoven," says Stallone.

"Nope. Not gonna say it," says Schwarzenegger.

What's Arnold got against Dvorak?

 

Didn't they name a keyboard after him?

[Irishman]

1 hour ago, HokieRif said:

I’m already regretting paying for the full year of MLB tv. If the offense can’t get it together soon, and consistently, we are looking at 100+ losses this season. 

Hokie, I am so glad I cancelled MLB tv last month because I knew Twins is not going to be a very good team.  They are terrible.  

 

Thiebar and Trashak need to go!   

 

[sampleSizeOfOne]

And to finish my report, just got home safely. We were seated high up down the right field line. Not really any chance to have a ball. At some point in the late innings the front passed through with most of the weather visible to the north of us. But then it got like, cold. And we got just a teasing of solid precipitation in the game, but something real right after while walking through Kenmore. It was not quite spring weather we had hoped for...

[sampleSizeOfOne]

2 minutes ago, Irishman said:

Hokie, I am so glad I cancelled MLB tv last month because I knew Twins is not going to be a very good team.  They are terrible.  

 

Thiebar and Trashak need to go!   

 

Or at least get going. They have succeeded in the past after all.

 

And i decided to use the funds i probably wouldn't have spent on mlb tv if i didn't get it free through the t-mobile offer (plan decided by employer long ago, and just kept it going on my own as i left) to support this here website. For that, i don't get to be an old-timey member any more. Bust despite the absence of recognition. We're steeped in that old-timey stuff.

[sampleSizeOfOne]

2 hours ago, LaBombo said:

I'm starting to feel like the top of the 8th was a bad time to turn the game on.

The good news is that after eating two meals' worth of Easter dinner I'm probably going to fall asleep before the Twins get the last out of the 8th.

Thanks for joining, and setting a fine example. Sleep is an apt response.

[LVTwinsfan]

Twins lost 8-1, even a “fixed lineup” could have trouble winning this one.

[stringer bell]

Not a fan of Rocco pinch-hitting for Gordon as early in the game as he has in two of the three games.