Rays 6, Twins 0 Twins Come Up Short Failing to Get First Sweep of Rays in Target Field History

[Theo Tollefson]

The Twins came into Sunday’s game looking to make their first sweep of the Rays in Target Field history. Unfortunately, the Twins fell short as the Rays took advantage of hit batters and bad fielding to salvage a win out of the three-game series. 

 

 

Box Score
SP: Cole Sands 4 2/3 IP, 5 H, 5 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, 2 HBP (101 pitches, 64 strikes (63.4 strike %))
Home Runs: None
Bottom 3 WPA: Cole Sands -.235, Gio Urshela, -.077, Byron Buxton -.071
Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

Cole Sands made another start, his first at Target Field, for the depleted Twins rotation on Sunday. Sands cruised through the first two innings allowing only one base runner on a pitch that got away from him and hit Randy Arozarena. In the top of the third, the Rays found a way to produce a run off of Sands as after a walk to Brett Phillips, Ji-Man Choi hit an RBI single to make it a 1-0 Rays lead.

In the fourth, the struggles continued both for Sands and the Twins defense. Sands again hit Arozarena with a pitch but found himself in a jam after a throwing error to get Kevin Kiermaier out at first. Then two more fielder's choices occurred, one that failed to get the next out on a bad judgment play at first by Jose Miranda. Then the Twins finally got an out on a Francisco Mejia fielder's choice nailed Kiermaier out at home.

After the fielding blunders by the Twins infield, Sands found a way out of the inning thanks to a Brett Phillips flyout and outfield assist from Gilberto Celestino that led to a throw out of Mejia at third. Sands escaped the inning with only two runs surrendered making it a 3-0 game as the Twins headed into the bottom of the fourth. 

The bats couldn’t get anything going for Cole Sands in the bottom of the fourth. Sands remained out on the mound for the bottom of the fifth and gave up a lead-off double to Manuel Margot. Sands was able to get the next two batters on a strikeout and groundout, but an Arozarena double and Kiermaier bloop single made it a 5-0 Rays lead and knocked Sands out for the day as he was at 101 pitches. 

Tyler Thornburg came into the game in relief for his Twins debut and recorded the last out rather easily. Again, the Twins bats remained cold in the bottom of the fifth and could not get anything going for run support. 

Thornburg remained in the game for both the sixth and seventh innings and allowed only one base runner on a walk to Choi in the bottom of the seventh. Aside from the walk, Thornburg dominated in his Twins debut going 2 1/3 scoreless, hitless innings. He had just the one strikeout that ended the fifth inning..

The Twins had their biggest threat to score going in the bottom of the sixth after Carlos Correa and Jorge Polanco drew walks with one out. But the following hitters did nothing to get Correa and Polanco home.

Tyler Duffey pitched the final two innings of the game for the Twins and even after giving up a home run to Kiermaier, showed improvement from his previous outings giving up only one additional hit and a walk.

In the bottom of the ninth, Luis Arraez, Miranda, and Gilberto Celestino came up for the Twins. Arraez and Miranda failed to get on base as Arraez struck out, Miranda grounded out, but Celestino walked to keep the inning alive with two outs. Celestino advanced to second on the first pitch of Trevor Larnach’s at-bat thanks to a wild pitch from Colin Poche. The game ended with a groundout by Larnach.

The Rays pitching dominated after two losses against the Twins lineup allowing nine base runners on five hits and four walks but never allowed a Twins base runner to advance past second base the entire game. The shutout by the Rays was the eighth time this season the Twins have been shutout, tied for the most shutouts against a team in Major League Baseball with the Arizona Diamondbacks and the Royals.

What’s Next? 
The Twins are on the road Monday night to start a six-game west coast road trip beginning in Seattle tomorrow night at 9:10 p.m. CT. The Twins will be sending Chris Archer out for the start while the Mariners have yet to announce a starter for Monday night’s game.  

Postgame Interview 

 

 

Bullpen Usage 

	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN	TOT
Pagán	15	0	15	21	0	51
Smith	0	26	24	0	0	50
Jax	27	0	14	0	0	41
Cotton	0	13	0	26	0	39
Moran	0	36	0	0	0	36
Thielbar	14	0	0	19	0	33
Duffey	0	0	0	0	33	33
Duran	0	15	0	16	0	31
Thornburg	0	0	0	0	26	26
Megill	0	0	0	16	0	16

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[puckstopper1]

That was a stinker all the way around.  I could have been worse, but Duffey and Thornburg saves the rest of the pen.

[mikelink45]

I love the way that you try to give Duffey an at a boy - he starts out giving up a HR.  It was not a good outing.  Oh well, we won two.  

[Rosterman]

A hit, a walk and a homerun. Thank goodness the homer was a solo. Duffey...well, at least he didn't make the game close.

101 pitches for Sands, Stretching him out. He needs to now work in St. Paul consistently before his next callup.

[Craig Arko]

Pretty sure it was being shutout that lost this one. 

[bighat]

Enough of Cole Sands - might be time for his agent to start looking at sending him out to join our old buddy Charlie Barnes in Japan. Guys like Sands and Barnes are just organizational fodder that end up in the meat grinder once in a while due to injuries. FWIW I think Barnes was far and away more successful than Sands in his brief stint.

 

[darwin22]

Although a rough day (and our 8th time being shutout this season), I expected it with Sands pitching.

Changing my negative tune...at least for today....I will instead focus on the POSITIVE (not my style):

#1  With all the warts and continued issues with this team--------lets not forget their in 1st place with a 3-game lead over CLE with a 35-27 record.

Last year, through 62 games---------10 games worse:   25-37

#2  Although an offensive stinker today, lets not ignore the fact that this offense scored 54 runs/ 6 per game over their last 9 against the BEST teams in the AL East.

#3   This team actually had a WINNING record against the 'Beasts of the East' with a 5-4 record.  

How many of us actually predicted "that" after losing 4 of 5 in DET?

#4   Correa's bat is looking its getting hot.  AVG up to .303---------2-3 today.

#5   Ryan and Gray are set to return to the rotation this week!  Hopefully, they won't be on a strict pitch count.

With the emergence of Smeltzer as a viable SP combined with the recent improvement of Archer----this at least for now gives our rotation a semblance of stability and quality.   I got to think if Ober can get healthy soon, the days of seeing Dylan Bundy starting are becoming fewer and fewer.  That is not a bad thing.

#6  Tyler Thornburg----yes in mop up duty, actually impressed me throwing 2.33 shutout innings.  

#7   Duffey:  Throwing him a bone here.......he got the last 5 outs without giving up a run.  

Not sure what others think, but I'd be satisfied with a 3-3 split on the road this week at SEA and AZ.

[TwinsDr2021]

101 pitches for Sands does that officially mean the Twins are done with him?

"This was his best start ... I thought he threw the ball really well." Rocco,

He gave up 5 runs in 4 2/3 and that is his best start, not a good sign, I have enough of the Sands experiment, time to see if another team thinks this 25 year old pitcher is worth anything (he will be 25 in a month)

I will add sitting Buxton and Correa at home on a Saturday was unacceptable (it worked Saturday), Me and my son were planning on going but we waited to get tickets until the lineup was announced and then decided not to, Had no plans on going today since Sands was pitching and that was going to be a loss no matter how well Buxton and Correa played, sure I get they were facing a lefty today and Saturday was a day after a night game, blah, blah, blah, but am not paying full price to see that lineup.

[rv78]

Unfortunately the way the Twins players get hurt we probably have not seen the last of Sands. It would be nice to see Ryan, Gray, Archer, Smeltzer and Ober make every start the rest of the season but we all know that won't happen. Arizona and Seattle both have losing records. Twins couldn't capitalize against the Royals and Tigers so it'll be interesting to see how they play out west. Seems they play "up to" or "down to" their competition. 

[Danchat]

Finally, a loss that wasn't a brutal giveaway!

As for Sands, I think he may be better off switching to being a reliever. I know that's always a first reaction to seeing a starting pitcher struggling when first coming up, but I don't think his stuff looks good enough to hang in the majors. Reminds me of when Zach Littell first came up - he looked way better once he moved to the pen and gained a few ticks on his fastball.

[TwinsAce]

Minor adjustment, but this was Sands second start at home this week.

I hope he continues in the right direction as a starter. He really doesn't like relief pitching...

[jorgenswest]

After his first 14 starts Berrios had an ERA over 8. Sands is not ready but  I sure would not DFA him based on a few months of bouncing back and forth this season.

[jimbo92107]

Listening on radio, I heard Dan Gladden repeat what I said a few days ago, that Duffey's curveball has lost its bite. Since spinning the ball has been his bread and butter his whole career, losing the spin is a very bad sign for Duffey. Possible that he's hiding some muscle or tendon pain, but without his curve, Duffey's other stuff is delicious cookies for hitters. 

At this point, if he needs to seriously reinvent himself (again), I think it's time Duffey did that somewhere it won't hurt the team. Twins desperately need to pursue a couple of veteran relief pitchers, so they can DFA Duffey. Not saying he can't come back, but his tricks aren't working anymore. 

[TwinsDr2021]

7 hours ago, jorgenswest said:

After his first 14 starts Berrios had an ERA over 8. Sands is not ready but  I sure would not DFA him based on a few months of bouncing back and forth this season.

You left out the minor detail that Berrios was 22 and Sands will turn 25 next month.  You don't have to DFA him, but could use him as part of a deal to get a relief pitcher.

[Riverbrian]

I thought the TB starter was impressive.

Jeffrey Springs was 30th round draft pick by the Rangers out of Appalachian State in 2015. He was never a top 30 prospect for any organization.

He bounced from the bullpens of the Rangers to the Red Sox to the Rays.

He started this season in the Rays bullpen and they converted him to starter in early May. They had injuries in the rotation and Josh Fleming was ineffective so the Rays tried something else.

This was Jeffrey Springs 8th start of the year. After shutting out the Twins his ERA sits at 1.45. 

The Rays find guys like this because they are very good at providing opportunity and then getting out of the way of players who are getting the job done. 

 

[jmlease1]

Duffey certainly has pitched himself out of any high leverage situations. It's too bad. I'm not sure we have enough quality options right now that dropping him from the roster does anything; might as well see if he can work out of it in low leverage roles while other guys get healthy.

Sands still needs work, but I wouldn't give up on him after his first stint in MLB. He's certainly got more upside than Charlie Barnes ever did. As guys get healthy in the rotation, I expect he goes back to AAA, where hopefully he applies lessons learned up here and improves. He's got some pitches that can play in MLB, but he's going to need to command them better to have success and he's not there yet.

defense was a bit rough, would like to see that cleaned up. But it's also evidence that Miranda is still learning 1B.

A bit disappointing to see the team so flat against the Rays; a sweep would have been great. But any time you win a series, I'm not really going to complain. Now we go on the road, and see if we can win series against a beatable Seattle team and an equally beatable Arizona squad.

[Karbo]

Sands pitched well enough in the 1st couple innings to make me wonder if he would fit as a long reliever?

[Mike Sixel]

4 hours ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

You left out the minor detail that Berrios was 22 and Sands will turn 25 next month.  You don't have to DFA him, but could use him as part of a deal to get a relief pitcher.

"he's terrible, we should trade him for a really good RP"......

Look, Sands is like 8th or so on the depth chart. Unfortunately, teams need that once in awhile. He's made how many starts now, and people think that he should be traded? He's not good enough to be a regular starter, and likely won't ever be. That doesn't mean he doesn't have value to a team like the Twins. 

He might be better as a RP....and I'd consider making him one. 

[Doctor Gast]

Twins need to burn those "Twinkies" baby blues. The Twins never do well with them.

[jimbo92107]

7 hours ago, TwinsDr2021 said:

You left out the minor detail that Berrios was 22 and Sands will turn 25 next month.  You don't have to DFA him, but could use him as part of a deal to get a relief pitcher.

I think Cole Sands has a good chance to be a solid mlb pitcher. We have all seen his good innings, where his heat rides low and his curves bend right near the edge, also low. That stuff will definitely get a lot of guys out. Regardless of age, it takes a year or two of experience for a rookie to figure out how to plug the holes in his game. Sands may not be quite ready to dominate, but what he needs to learn will not come at the AAA level. Twins should consider moving him to the bullpen, maybe replacing one of several weak links there. Let Sands cut loose with a hotter heater and fewer pitches for the remainder of the season. Then build him up physically and mentally to get back into the starting rotation. 

[USAFChief]

4 hours ago, Doctor Gast said:

 those "Twinkies" baby blues. 

Those are putrid.

[ashbury]

35 minutes ago, USAFChief said:

Those are putrid.

They evoke some great memories for me; I enjoy the look.  But if they're a documented jinx, nuke 'em from outer space.  (During such time as no player is wearing one, of course.  Except [name your current least favorite roster member].)

[Doctor Gast]

1 hour ago, USAFChief said:

Those are putrid.

The Yankee's pinstripes evoke respect.

To commerate the anniversary of the Twins World Series victories and try to regain the winning feeling, the Twins FO brought back the baby blues. The FO didn't researched what they were doing because  the baby blues represents the era that the Twins were so bad and when they were most ridiculed. The very year they terminated that uniform was the year they won the WS.

Twin's baby blues evoke lack of respect.