Week in Review: Breaking Bad

[Nick Nelson]

The All-Star break has arrived, and the Minnesota Twins are breaking down. A tough injury to a key player topped off a deflating finish to the first half. 

Can they use the coming time off as an opportunity to turn around their lengthy run of underwhelming performance?

Weekly Snapshot: Mon, 7/11 through Sun, 7/17
***
Record Last Week: 2-4 (Overall: 50-44)
Run Differential Last Week: -22 (Overall: +28)
Standing: 1st Place in AL Central (2.0 GA)

Last Week's Game Results:

Game 89 | MIL 6, MIN 3: Winder Struggles in Rainy, Delay-Filled Loss
Game 90 | MIN 4, MIL 1: Miranda Delivers with 9th-Inning Walk-Off
Game 91 | CWS 12, MIN 2: Gray Knocked Around as Sox Rout Twins
Game 92 | CWS 6, MIN 2: Twins Outplayed by White Sox Again
Game 93 | MIN 6, CWS 3: Arraez, Correa Homer as Lineup Awakens
Game 94 | CWS 11, MIN 0: Blowout Concludes First Half

NEWS & NOTES

On May 24th, the Twins won their sixth consecutive game to move 11 games over .500, at 27-16. They were five and a half games up in the division. Since then, they've gone 23-28, failing to extend that division lead because they've failed to settle into a sustained groove at any point.

While Rocco Baldelli and the Twins deserve credit for their resiliency – they haven't lost more than three games in a row all season – they also have earned criticism for their inability to get on a roll, winning more than two consecutive games only once in the past eight weeks (they won three straight June 25-27).

A consistently leaky bullpen has been a big culprit, but so too is a feast-or-famine offense that goes into maddening slumps – an issue that re-emerged in a disappointing final week of the first half. And the lineup has now unfortunately lost a critical piece.

Ryan Jeffers had been coming around in a big way, with an .847 OPS in his past 20 games, before lingering thumb pain forced him to the injured list on Friday. Further scans revealed a small fracture requiring surgery, so Jeffers will be out 6-to-8 weeks – most of the remaining regular season.

Replacing him is Caleb Hamilton, a six-year minor-league veteran who has earned his chance by playing really well in St. Paul, where he was slashing .252/.387/.491 in 49 games, splitting time between catcher, third, and DH. He'll serve as backup catcher with Gary Sánchez elevating into a primary starter role.

Josh Winder was optioned back to Triple-A after an uninspiring effort against the Brewers on Tuesday, with Joe Smith returning from IL to the bullpen. Smith had an unconscionably bad outing in Sunday's loss, and is immediately in DFA territory. 

Devin Smeltzer, experiencing some hardcore regression in his own right, followed Winder to Triple-A on Sunday to make room for Chris Archer, who was also bad on Sunday.

While Winder and Smeltzer try to battle their way back to the majors, Miguel Sanó's campaign is already well underway. He launched two home runs for the Saints on Saturday night. There's been talk of the Twins moving on without Sanó, who has about a week left on his rehab designation, but I'm not sure how they could pass up the chance to at least try and unlock his difference-making potential, if it's still in there. They need a spark. 

HIGHLIGHTS

When the Twins lineup has gotten a spark lately, it's generally been coming from the young sluggers, which is a good sign. José Miranda came through with his biggest hit as a major-leaguer on Wednesday, launching a walk-off three-run homer in the ninth against Milwaukee. 

His celebratory stare into the dugout was epic – another of those signature "I belong" moments.

Miranda pairs with Alex Kirilloff to paint an exciting future for the middle of the Twins lineup from both sides of the plate. Kirilloff went 6-for-20 in a week that included a key two-run double with two outs. He's taken on the much-needed role of a run producer, with 20 RBIs in 28 games since returning from Triple-A.

Carlos Correa enjoyed a good week with six hits including a big home run in Saturday's win. Jorge Polanco chipped in two more homers as his mid-summer power surge rages on. 

While the bullpen as a unit has not been a highlight for the Twins through the break, Jhoan Duran is a huge exception (literally) and one of the team's most important players. The 6-foot-5 fireballer closed out his first half in style on Saturday with a two-inning save that included two strikeouts. He previously picked up the win on Wednesday, escaping a tight spot in the ninth to set up Miranda's magic.

LOWLIGHTS

Byron Buxton feels like a perfect embodiment of the Twins offense as a whole, which I suppose is fitting since he's become the face of the franchise. 

Both he and the lineup are extremely talented and powerful, capable of more or less carrying the team at times. But they're also prone to major slumps where they are providing basically nothing.

It's been one of those latter periods for Buxton lately – and by no coincidence the Twins are going through one of their worst stretches of the season. Buck's all-or-nothing approach is producing the latter result all often, making him more of a liability than asset while frequently playing at DH and always near the top of the order.

The past week saw him go 5-for-22 with 11 strikeouts and one walk. He scored twice and drove in one. Dating back to the explosion in early June when he hit four home runs in two days against New York and Tampa, Buxton is batting .185 with a .254 OBP. 

It's a really strange time for Buxton fans such as myself. He was named an All-Star Game starter on Sunday, replacing Mike Trout. It's great to see him getting his due. At the same time, he's going through one of the worst prolonged stretches of his post-breakout career. 

Buxton's supposed to be leading this offense as its elite centerpiece, but instead he's throttling it by making out after out. Can some mental and physical rest in the week ahead help him straighten out his spiraling game? 

The top of the Twins rotation is looking shaky with Sonny Gray stumbling his way into the break. He backed up a disappointing letdown in Texas with an even worse performance against the White Sox at Target Field. 

Gray had nothing working on Thursday night, surrendering six earned runs on nine hits, including a back-breaking grand slam by Luis Robert. He couldn't get through four innings.

That's been a trend for the starters. Smeltzer failed to complete four innings on Friday and Archer couldn't get through five in his return from IL on Sunday. Winder surrendered five innings on Tuesday, and now has a 9-to-10 K/BB ratio in 23 innings his past five appearances after starting out 20-to-4 in his first 22 ⅓. 

At one point, Winder and Smeltzer were looking like impact reinforcements for a rotation led by the high-performing veteran in Gray and aided by a sneaky free agent pickup in Archer. Now all of these things are in question, or worse, and it's got the looks of a house of cards ready to collapse. If it hasn't already.

The Twins bullpen has barely equipped to supplement a good rotation. It has no hope of making up for a bad one.

TRENDING STORYLINE

This team needs serious help. A few weeks ago, one could've argued that a frontline starter was a nice-to-have more so than an essential addition. I don't think you can make that case anymore. If the Twins have any aspirations of a postseason run, they need to bring in a starter who is as good or better than Gray. That's pretty cut and dry.

They also, obviously, need at least one impact reliever and probably two. AND they may now find themselves in the market for a catcher, in light of the Jeffers news.

The coming trade deadline – coming up in just over two weeks, on August 2nd – figures to be one of the most intriguing and consequential for the Twins in many years. We'll have plenty of coverage here at Twins Daily, including special premium content for caretakers: division-by-division breakdowns of buyers, sellers, and targets of interest for the Twins – delivered to your inbox.

If you haven't yet, make sure to sign up at any tier to ensure you don't miss out. 

LOOKING AHEAD

Lots of time off. Then a two-game series in Detroit to kick off the second half. 

SATURDAY, 7/23: TWINS @ TIGERS
SUNDAY, 7/24: TWINS @ TIGERS

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[minman1982]

Is this a team that can compete in the postseason this year?  Before you look at what types of moves to make at the deadline, you have to evaluate what a realistic outcome for this team is.  Given the Twins recent postseason history, winning a single postseason game would be huge even if they go no where.  Young pitchers with multiple years of team control should be the targets.  The Twins need to be thinking about 2023, 2024, and 2025.  If they can get some pitching to go along with their offense, they could be one of the best teams in baseball.  

[ashbury]

1 hour ago, minman1982 said:

Is this a team that can compete in the postseason this year?  Before you look at what types of moves to make at the deadline, you have to evaluate what a realistic outcome for this team is.  Given the Twins recent postseason history, winning a single postseason game would be huge even if they go no where.  Young pitchers with multiple years of team control should be the targets.  The Twins need to be thinking about 2023, 2024, and 2025.  If they can get some pitching to go along with their offense, they could be one of the best teams in baseball.  

I wouldn't push the chips all in on 2022, no.  But the FO should be able to shore up the bullpen some, without mortgaging the future in any significant way.  First place is still worth something and it would be dereliction to not even try after the good start.

[Morneau for Gov]

I haven't looked, but what would the Twins record be with a good bullpen?! I recently saw a stat showing that the Twins have converted 20 of 37 save opportunities, ouch!

Is there anything more demoralizing than blowing leads late in games?

[umterp23]

One of the things I have issue with is how much these guys get so many rest days in the lineup week in week out.  Granted we always here that we need to keep them healthy for late season push and playoffs.  Way too many times a player (insert any name in lineup) plays a day, gets a day off, plays a day gets already scheduled day off, then another off day and then plays.  My goodness, there is no continuity in a players game to rest so many days in a week.  When a batter is in a groove and then sits for a day or two straight, no cage session will mirror anything being done on the field.  When you throw a "B-lineup" out there when you can go for the sweep dagger or series win, some L's at times are just a given.

Jeffers was on a roll in a positive way while playing with a broken thumb on his throwing hand is the tough as nails kind of guy mentality our team needs from all the players. Some have it on this team and some don't. Sucks to lose him for dog days of summer.  Sanchez sure better be the guy as he mouthed off he would be in spring training.  He gets what he wished for, but has been uninspiring thus far. 

Bullpen other than a couple bright spots is really bad.  Pagan single handily blew 5 swing games vs Guardians where your lead would have been 11-12 games at the time vs just 2.5 now.  Granted the lost series to Sox didn't help so let's say the lead is 7-8 games.  

Starting Pitcher, 2 RP and 1 Hitter are in need.  You could say more but have to be realistic with 40 man and other suitors in chasing valuable adds with other teams.  Players to move to help get some insurgence of players chasing playoffs that might not be on good teams:  Gordon, Urshela, Garlick, Cave and other Milb players that don't have a clear path to Twins roster.  To me, nothing is off the table at this point.  '22 is a year the fans will gauge are we in or out.  Don't sell the farm but for '23 and beyond, but your playoff window is open this year, better take advantage.

[Jeff D.]

The Twins have good players. The present mediocrity of this team after the first three months is not surprising. Pitching is our downfall along with consistency at the plate. The team will need to really show some inspiration and aggressiveness with the 68 games remaining if they are to even get to the playoffs. It is only my opinion that we need to really think of trading Kepler, Sano, Jeffers minimally for pitching for us to regain momentum. I personally believe that our manager has a tremendous influence as to why we are mediocre and passive. Leading the majors in times shut out says a lot about the team's characteristic. He needs to go.

[cheeseheadgophfan]

1 hour ago, umterp23 said:

One of the things I have issue with is how much these guys get so many rest days in the lineup week in week out.  Granted we always here that we need to keep them healthy for late season push and playoffs.  Way too many times a player (insert any name in lineup) plays a day, gets a day off, plays a day gets already scheduled day off, then another off day and then plays.  My goodness, there is no continuity in a players game to rest so many days in a week.  When a batter is in a groove and then sits for a day or two straight, no cage session will mirror anything being done on the field.  When you throw a "B-lineup" out there when you can go for the sweep dagger or series win, some L's at times are just a given.

Jeffers was on a roll in a positive way while playing with a broken thumb on his throwing hand is the tough as nails kind of guy mentality our team needs from all the players. Some have it on this team and some don't. Sucks to lose him for dog days of summer.  Sanchez sure better be the guy as he mouthed off he would be in spring training.  He gets what he wished for, but has been uninspiring thus far. 

Bullpen other than a couple bright spots is really bad.  Pagan single handily blew 5 swing games vs Guardians where your lead would have been 11-12 games at the time vs just 2.5 now.  Granted the lost series to Sox didn't help so let's say the lead is 7-8 games.  

Starting Pitcher, 2 RP and 1 Hitter are in need.  You could say more but have to be realistic with 40 man and other suitors in chasing valuable adds with other teams.  Players to move to help get some insurgence of players chasing playoffs that might not be on good teams:  Gordon, Urshela, Garlick, Cave and other Milb players that don't have a clear path to Twins roster.  To me, nothing is off the table at this point.  '22 is a year the fans will gauge are we in or out.  Don't sell the farm but for '23 and beyond, but your playoff window is open this year, better take advantage.

So we need a starting pitcher, 2 relief pitchers and a hitter, but don't sell the farm?  Good luck with that.

IMO....we don't need a hitter.  Who are you benching?  What we need is guys to perform to their contracts (Correa and Buxton) and the young guys to continue to develop (Miranda and AK).  If we are going to get Montas or Castillo we are going to have to give up some real assets, not Cave, Gordon, Urshella, etc.....

I'm hopeful that Ober can help soon.  Maeda as a bullpen piece?  Take a run at a real ace, and get an expiring contract relief stud.  I'd much rather see Smeltzer and Winder in the bullpen than Smith and Pagan.  

[mikelink45]

I have been without internet for a few days here in Alaska and checked in to see how we were doing with the White Sox I'm not sure it was a good thing to check in.

Once again we go against a good team and fold up there was no contest except for the one game and we are supposed to be making a statement.

Losing Jeffers hurts the most because you don't have any real catching depth as an earlier article on TD emphasize

There are a lot of mysteries to solve coming out of the All-Star game. How do we get relief pitching and starting pitching are already discussed in all of the post and I don't have any idea. Who you trade and who you get.  the minors don't seem to help the answers. 

Sano looks ready but where does he play and do we need him? Can he pitch, can you catch?

And then there is the Buxton question. Do you continue to keep them in the top of the lineup when he's in these slumps? Does he continue to take up the DH role when he's not heading?

 

[Game7-91]

Realistic analysis Nick, and looking forward to TD trade deadline content.

Agree with others here, we have vets underperforming in batting order, one more batter is not going to change that. Their investing a lot for CC and Buck to produce, they shouldnt need more otside help.

But this is a conundrum on the pitching side. Given the weakness of ALC, the FO will have to do something to try to improve both SP and BP. At the same time, doing it without giving up milb guys they project onto MLB next year,....Tall order. Do you justify moving some combo of Wallner/Steer /SWR/ Martin/Cantorino/Festa/Miller/CES.....it will be painful to get Castillo or Montas, so the circle comes back to all-in type trade, middling-maybe type, or out completely in 2022? With their history, Twins probably try the middle way, look to score on an undervalued SP and BP guy, and let the chips fall.

All this has me thinking abt the current dividional alignments in relation to the expanded playoff field, The question is live in large part because of the weak competition in ALC....feeling a different thread topic coming here. But it feels like the impending trades are as much a matter of curcumstance as planning.

[PDX Twin]

I'm not buying for 2022 at the deadline. One or two patches will not make this team into a championship contender. We are better than, say, Pittsburgh, but our results against New York, Houston, and the Dodgers are telling a true story. The Twins are good enough to win some games and beat poor teams more often than that, but not good enough to win big games against top competition.

Don't give up anything of value to try to salvage something from 2022. If you can make a trade using something with limited value going forward (Sano, perhaps Kepler, redundant youngsters), to get something useful in 2023 and 2024, then do it. Otherwise, not for me.

[SpicyGarvSauce]

This FO/organization will not do anything significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

[IndianaTwin]

5 hours ago, Morneau for Gov said:

I haven't looked, but what would the Twins record be with a good bullpen?! I recently saw a stat showing that the Twins have converted 20 of 37 save opportunities, ouch!

Is there anything more demoralizing than blowing leads late in games?

The bullpen has been bad, but calculating a percentage of save opportunities isn't really an accurate representation, because of how it treats "save opportunities."

Take Kendall Graveman of the White Sox, for example. He shows up with 5 saves and 4 blown saves, which makes him look ineffective. It seems like only a 55.6 percent. The issue is that the four "blown saves" all came in innings prior to the ninth. Yes, they were "blown saves," because he was pitching in what would have been a save opportunity had he finished the game, but the likelihood of him actually doing so was slim, because Liam Hendricks probably would have gotten the ninth.

But because he didn't get the save when he pitches well in the eighth and Hendricks finishes, those games don't help him in that 5 of 9 calculation. Said more simply, a reliever pitching the eighth can often get a "blown save" to count against him, but isn't given the opportunity to get a save to count for him.

That's where the hold comes in. He has 14 of those. Those were times when he pitched in a "save situation," but someone else got the save (or someone else blew the game after him). In the case of Graveman, it's more helpful to say that he has had 19 "saves plus holds" in 23 "saves plus holds opportunities." That's 82.6 percent, which is a much better representation of how effective he has been. 

Make sense? Again, I agree that the record would be much better with a better bullpen. My post is more about the challenge of "save opportunities" as a way of measuring bullpen success. 

[IndianaTwin]

13 minutes ago, SpicyGarvSauce said:

This FO/organization will not do anything significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

What is your definition of "significant"?

 

My experience has been that in statements of this nature, particularly when a "guarantee" is added, the definition of "significant" is typically "a little more than whatever they actually do." In other words, the writer often has already decided in advance whether the person will meet their expectations, and the answer is "no, they won't."

Additionally, statements like this don't count the trades that were not made. Those are "significant" as well. Last winter, if a team had offered a good starting pitcher for Miranda and we said, "yes," we might have called that "significant." But if that offer had been Chris Sale for Miranda, it would have been "significant" to have said "no," but we would never have heard about it.

[MTV]

I’m incredibly eager to see what the Twins do this deadline, because moves will be made. With Jeffers out until at least September the Twins should chase after a better catcher, I doubt they’ll get Willson Contreras but an Omar Narvaez or a Sean Murphy would be nice. Along with that try to fix the outfield, it’s been great defensively but kind of lackluster offensively. The Twins will need another starter and 2 more bullpen arms, and we have enough in the farm to acquire such feats. Let’s see Minnesota go far this year.

[LA VIkes Fan]

Honest analysis. I agree that we need one impact starter, 2 bullpen pieces, and a hitter. This Lineup needs another run producer in the number 4 spot in the order and it ain't Max Kepler and I don't think it will be Miguel Sano. 

Where I disagree is the idea that the choice is either to stand pat or "gut the farm" to improve the team for this year and potentially next. We have a lot of prospect capital. The value of prospect capital isn't simply to graduate people to the MLB roster over time, it's equally as important to have that so we can trade it when we need to, not just to keep it forever. More than half of these guys will never amount to much on a MLB roster. We need to stop obsessing about keeping every single prospect who might have one flash in the pan year or even a solid MLB career, and use that prospect capital to improve the MLB club. That's 1 of the things it's for.

Here's my dream of how you do this to improve the team and I don't think it means that we are "gutting the farm" (all trades vetted through Baseball Trade Values):

1) Laranch and Canterino to the As for Montas and Puk . . . or Larnach, Canterino, and an A Ball guy to the Reds for Castillo. Starting pitching added, maybe with a left handed reliever.  

2) Sands, Strotman and Julien to Nationals for Josh Bell and Tanner Rainey. Throw in Sano and enough cash to pay his salary so he doesn't add or subtract from value. The Nationals get pitching prospects, and outfield prospect, and a replacement 1B with maybe some upside. Gets us a #4 hitter and solid 7th inning type reliever.  

3.  Here's the tough one - Enlow for Daniel Robertson of the Cubs or Enlow and Festa for Jorge Lopez of the Orioles. Closer added. 

4. Archer goes into the bullpen as a late inning reliever/closer (with this contract adjusted so he can reach incentives), and Winder goes into the bullpen as a long reliever/6th starter. Pagan is thrown into some trade, maybe to the Cubs or A's, demoted with his consent to work on things in St. Paul, or released.

Thoughts? I don't see this as gutting the farm in any way. Sure, losing these guys will hurt and maybe this is not enough to get the people I mentioned, although Baseball Trade Value seems to think it is, but to me this is one of the reasons you build up your farm system - To trade prospects for established MLB players when doing so have the chance to put you in a contending position. I think that's where we are. I would make each of these deals if available.

[cHawk]

4 hours ago, SpicyGarvSauce said:

This FO/organization will not do anything significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

The FO/organization will absolutely do something significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

[umterp23]

7 hours ago, cheeseheadgophfan said:

So we need a starting pitcher, 2 relief pitchers and a hitter, but don't sell the farm?  Good luck with that.

IMO....we don't need a hitter.  Who are you benching?  What we need is guys to perform to their contracts (Correa and Buxton) and the young guys to continue to develop (Miranda and AK).  If we are going to get Montas or Castillo we are going to have to give up some real assets, not Cave, Gordon, Urshella, etc.....

I'm hopeful that Ober can help soon.  Maeda as a bullpen piece?  Take a run at a real ace, and get an expiring contract relief stud.  I'd much rather see Smeltzer and Winder in the bullpen than Smith and Pagan.  

We shouldn't sell the farm because we won't get a Montas or Castillo type of piece.  The top 5-6 clubs in the bigs have assets that will get that type of pitcher.  Wouldn't give up a Kiriloff or Miranda but get me a pitcher that can help move Archer/Bundy to the pen or even an Ober to the pen, I'm good with giving up a Larnach and some MiLB combos.  Move Sano, Gordon, Urshela and some other MiLB assets and you get a hitter than can be added to the lineup.  For instance you get Bell from Nats, you can move Kiriloff to LF and rotate him in at 1B.  Celestino can play left on rotational basis or Garlick for that matter.  hell Garlick hardly plays now so you can move him as well.  Sanchez will no longer DH with Jeffers on IL till September, so backup catcher Hamilton will get maybe on start a game.  If you play your regulars5-6 games a week, there are plenty of at bats to go around.  

[IndianaTwin]

1 hour ago, cHawk said:

The FO/organization will absolutely do something significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

That would be consistent with prior years. Last year, I went to the work of counting the number of July trades by the Twins and by all of MLB over the course of several years. What I found was that the Twins were considerably above average in the number of trades they made. Given where they are at in the standings, I think it’s more likely than not that they will be active traders. 

 

[USAFChief]

2 hours ago, cHawk said:

The FO/organization will absolutely do something significant at the deadline.

Guaranteed.

You're in a bit of a no-lose situation here...

Doing something significant would be significant. 

But doing nothing significant would also be...significant.