Twins 3, White Sox 8: White Sox's Bats Overpower Twins

[Sherry Cerny]

Tuesday night was the penultimate game of the 2022 season. The Twins and White Sox are two teams looking to finish out their seasons. The Twins pitching (and defense) gave up runs early on that made it hard for the offense to bounce back.

Image courtesy of Jeff Biggerstaff, USA Today

Box Score
Starting Pitcher: Josh Winder 2 IP, 5 H, 4 ER, 1 BB, 2 K (69 pitches, 38 strikes (55%))
Home Runs: Jermaine Palacios (1)
Bottom 3 WPA:  Josh Winder (-.319), Carlos Correa (-.100), Aaron Sanchez (-.088)
Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

The White Sox offense overpowered the Twins pitching on Tuesday. By the time the fourth inning came around, the White Sox had an 8-1 lead. 

Josh Winder had his final outing of the season. He struggled with his command early on in the first and second inning and by the third inning and his second time through the lineup, he allowed four earned runs and posted 69 pitches.

Not the ideal way to end his season, but with all the injuries, coaching changes and movement in the pitching rotation, the Twins pitching overall struggled throughout the season. Winder pitched 14 games for the Twins this season, missing all but one game in the month of June. He ends the season with a 4.70 ERA, 47 strikeouts, and 17 walks over 67 innings. 

Aaron Sanchez came out to relieve Winder and struggled heavily in the fourth giving up four runs and 32 pitches. 

White Sox starter Lucas Giolito also had a rough start to his night on the mound. Early on he hit Nick Gordon, and he followed it by hitting Jose Miranda. The ball hit off his wrist and into his cheek and mouth. Miranda laid on the ground covering home plate until lead trainer Michael Salazar came out and looked him over. Salazar had Miranda do a series of tests verbally and physically to ensure Miranda was okay; however, either not convinced of his ‘feeling okay’ or out of caution, Salazar pulled Miranda from the game. It was later reported that he had a lip and cheek contusion and would be “day-to-day”. 

Manager Rocco Baldelli replaced him with Jermaine Palacios. The slip from Lucas Giolito, whose command also wasn't the greatest starting out, had him a bit flustered, but he held his composure and moved forward getting the second out of the inning and powered through seven innings to hold the Twins to just two runs before leaving the game. 

Jake Cave came up to bat, and drove in his 20th run of the season, scoring Gordon and getting the Twins on the board first. The offense remained stagnant through the next few innings, prompting Baldelli to make some changes by pulling out Correa and Urshela, with the exception of Luis Arraez, who is still leading the race for the American League Batting Title. Palacios moved over to short for Carlos Correa from first base where he was covering for Miranda. Caleb Hamilton took over at first base, Billy Hamilton took over at second base, and Nick Gordon moved to third base for Gio Urshela, leaving only two men on the bench: Mark Contreras and Gary Sanchez. 

The pace of the game certainly slowed down after the first run. In the sixth inning, Caleb Hamilton and Billy Hamilton both walked, Nick Gordon followed with a grounder to center, scoring Caleb Hamilton. 

The Twins bullpen, Jovani Moran, Emilio Pagan, and Jorge Lopez, brought the game to a close not allowing any more damage to be done. 

Palacios came to bat in the bottom of the ninth with two outs. He knocked a ball to dead center, 105mph for a home run. It was Palacios' first major-league homer. 

They may not have won but the home run was fun to see and they have one more chance tomorrow afternoon to go out with a win and for Arraez to add to his batting average before the close of the season. Tune in to see how the batting title finishes!

Pitching for Season Finale: 
Wednesday 3:10 pm CST: RHP Louie Varland (0-2 4.71 ERA) v. RHP Davis Martin (3-5, 3.65 ERA) 

Postgame Interviews

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

 

 

View full article

[tony&rodney]

Scuffling to close the year.

[AceWrigley]

Billy Hamilton at 2B? Grabbed my varmint gun and headed out in the hopes that please, something is moving out there.

[D.C Twins]

"Tough night season offensively. Tough night season all around."

[h2oface]

Duran hasn't pitched for 8 days now...... since Tuesday, Sept 27,

[RaoulDuke]

2 hours ago, h2oface said:

Duran hasn't pitched for 8 days now...... since Tuesday, Sept 27,

They are well out of it, let the man rest.

I am amazed they got the season out of Duran they did.  He was one of the top 5 relievers in baseball in his rookie year with no real experience in the role, as well as basically missing 2 full seasons due to injury and the covid year.

He was awesome all year but the way things were going I kept expecting him to break from overuse.  He stayed strong and exceeded any possible expectations, shut him down and sacrifice to the gods for this level of health every year.

[mikelink45]

The Sox will finish 500 - the Twins...

The only thing I was interested in was Winder.  Sorry he had a bad game.  I thought, going in to the season that he would pass Ober, which certainly isn't true.  

[Jeff D.]

I commend you for writing about loss after loss. Good for Palacios! Wishing Luis the batting crown.

Good Grief this club has mailed it in.....

Twins Geezer .....out!

[William K Johnson]

Liked seeing Gordon at third.   He needs some reps there in spring training next season so as to allow him the ability to play three infield positions and all outfield positions.

[DJL44]

A Twins loss and a Red Sox win and they move up a spot in the MLB draft. That seems to be the goal the past few weeks.

[bighat]

2 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

The Sox will finish 500 - the Twins...

The only thing I was interested in was Winder.  Sorry he had a bad game.  I thought, going in to the season that he would pass Ober, which certainly isn't true.  

He's had some very bad games after returning. Absolutely no reason for anyone to think he'll be a solid piece of this rotation next year - another huge question mark in a sea of question marks for the 2023 Twins.

[Whitey333]

Another typical Twins game.  Poor execution, poor pitching, poor managing.  Injuries not withstanding this team plays poor fundamentals and boring baseball the past two seasons.  With the current leadership told by upper management that they are doing a great job, I expect another dismal season in 2023.

[Blyleven2011]

Suffering through the losses , and celebrating the wins  , hopefully the twins can win the last game of the season  ...

Go Louie  varland and make minnesota proud  ....

[Doctor Gast]

Happy for Palacios, let's hope that opened the dam. Twins are showing especially bad defense which is to be expected with the influx of new inexperienced gloves. That's the goal giving them experience they need & better evaluate them. Good luck to Luiz & Louie, let's go out with a bang! Go Twins!

[RpR]

3 hours ago, William K Johnson said:

Liked seeing Gordon at third.   He needs some reps there in spring training next season so as to allow him the ability to play three infield positions and all outfield positions.

None very well.

[Eephus]

 In a world with goofy stuff happening all the time, having a hitter with a  .363 OPS (that's after the home run) jog out of the box watching the ball soar to faraway land of deep center and it goes out by a few inches...Tom Kelly would not approve.

[jmlease1]

2 hours ago, bighat said:

He's had some very bad games after returning. Absolutely no reason for anyone to think he'll be a solid piece of this rotation next year - another huge question mark in a sea of question marks for the 2023 Twins.

15 earned runs in 5 starts since returning in 21 2/3 innings. Not great and we saw his ERA jump a run as it merged towards his FIP. he just didn't look very good last night. He's clearly got some things to work on in the offseason, and while I'm not ready to give up on him he had some quality outings and has good stuff, he looks like a guy who will likely start the season in AAA next year, and is slipping behind varland & SWR as rotation contenders. I'm wondering if his future might be in the bullpen as a guy who is asked to go 2+ innings in a relief appearance. (I'm of the opinion you need 2 guys in the bullpen next season who are expected to go 2+ innings when they come into a game and only pitch every 3 days as part of the solve for shorter starts)

The Miranda HBP looked nasty. Hope he's ok and doesn't have any concussion symptoms. Obviously no intent (and you could see Giolito felt awful about it) but really hate seeing Miranda get nailed like that. Appreciate his attempts to stay in the game, but approve the caution in telling him to take a seat. dang, that looked like it hurt!

[bighat]

28 minutes ago, Eephus said:

 In a world with goofy stuff happening all the time, having a hitter with a  .363 OPS (that's after the home run) jog out of the box watching the ball soar to faraway land of deep center and it goes out by a few inches...Tom Kelly would not approve.

Complete with not one but TWO finger-kiss / point-to-the-sky actions, and finished with a Sammy Sosa bunny-hop onto home plate. 

First ever MLB homer for the guy. Honestly, I have no problem with it but I can see how some people might roll their eyes. 

[MMMordabito]

6 hours ago, mikelink45 said:

The Sox will finish 500 - the Twins...

The only thing I was interested in was Winder.  Sorry he had a bad game.  I thought, going in to the season that he would pass Ober, which certainly isn't true.  

Same here, especially after Miranda was out, Arraez got his hit and it was reported that Judge was pulled after his homer.

Winder has some nasty breaking stuff, but it isn't going to play if his fastball command doesn't improve.  Way too many long PAs against him that seemed to start with non-competitive fastballs.

I still think Winder has a lot of upside, but he should probably be #8/9 in the 2023 pecking order plans until he tightens things up.

[Mike Sixel]

5 minutes ago, MMMordabito said:

Same here, especially after Miranda was out, Arraez got his hit and it was reported that Judge was pulled after his homer.

Winder has some nasty breaking stuff, but it isn't going to play if his fastball command doesn't improve.  Way too many long PAs against him that seemed to start with non-competitive fastballs.

I still think Winder has a lot of upside, but he should probably be #8/9 in the 2023 pecking order plans until he tightens things up.

Agreed on that last part.

[DJL44]

20 hours ago, Doctor Gast said:

Happy for Palacios, let's hope that opened the dam. Twins are showing especially bad defense which is to be expected with the influx of new inexperienced gloves.

I don't know why their infield defense numbers are so bad this season. Urshela and Correa dropped compared to previous seasons. Polanco had the worst season of his career.

[DJL44]

19 hours ago, bighat said:

Complete with not one but TWO finger-kiss / point-to-the-sky actions, and finished with a Sammy Sosa bunny-hop onto home plate. 

First ever MLB homer for the guy. Honestly, I have no problem with it but I can see how some people might roll their eyes. 

If you've just hit what might be the only major league home run of your entire career I  bet you would enjoy it as much as possible.

[Doctor Gast]

1 hour ago, DJL44 said:

I don't know why their infield defense numbers are so bad this season. Urshela and Correa dropped compared to previous seasons. Polanco had the worst season of his career.

I really don't trust some defensive stats. Urshela & Correa's defense might have dropped some but still they played pretty good defense. The problem with Polanco was that he had been playing hurt the 2nd half & kept playing him w/o any break (so his defense is expected to be bad if he's playing well below 100%) till he broke and those that relaced him Arraez, Gordon & Hamilton have been terrible. Miranda's bat is terrific but his glove leaves a lot to be desired. Now with the addition of Wallner our defense has taken on a different dimension. The Twins & Wallner need this time to try to work out some defects & to evaluate.

[William K Johnson]

On 10/5/2022 at 11:48 AM, RpR said:

None very well.

You are correct.   We should go with Jake Cave as our left-handed outfielder and Placidios as our back-up infielder.   And we wonder why this team can't move forward.