Roadkill: The Twins Need to Reverse This Ugly Trend from 2022

[Steven Trefz]

The story of where it all went wrong last year begins and ends on the road…

Image courtesy of Jay Biggerstaff-USA TODAY Sports

If the Twins want playoffs in 2023 (let alone a World Series Championship), at the very least, one thing must occur. If you toss out whatever the empty stands 2020 season brought us, no team since 2015 has made the playoffs with a road record of less than .460. Not a single team. This statistical oddity stands out more clearly when comparing the 2022 Twins squad against the 2019 Bomba Squad. What would you say if I told you that the Twins' home records for those two seasons were exactly the same!? 

It's true. Once the shock wore off, I triple-checked it. In the 2019 and 2022 seasons, the Twins were a respectable and playoff-bound 46-35 at home. So what made the difference between the excitement and potential of the 2019 playoff run and last year’s disappointment? To put it bluntly: road trips.

In 2019, the Twins were an astounding 55-28 on the road! In 2022, the Twins managed a below-MLB road record average 32-49 mark. (Click here for another, less recent, trip down the rabbit hole of why home teams win 54% of games in the MLB.) That’s a 23-win difference on the road between 2019 and 2022! How on earth does such a thing transpire?

Well, for the 2022 Twins, it happened slowly and consistently over the entirety of the season.

In fact, the only two road trips that the Twins secured a winning record were the second and third trips of the 2022 season. (They went 4-3 against Tampa Bay and Baltimore and 5-1 against Oakland and Kansas City.) They played around .500 ball on the road the rest of the way until the fateful ninth trip to Los Angeles in mid-August. After going 1-4 against the Dodgers and Angels, the Twins finished their last four road trips 5-19. 5…and…19….

So what went wrong on the road? A couple of abnormal instances pop up when you dig a little deeper. The Twins were 6-23 in road games determined by 2 runs or less. In fact, the “pitchers taking the L on the road” list runs like a who’s who of the Twins bullpen. No one leaves unscathed.

Also, during the end of the season road collapse, the Twins were without Byron Buxton. Yet, they managed to go 15-10 at home during this same stretch of games. So what about Byron’s absence made the road woes so magnified? In fact, the Twins went 6-23 overall on the road in 2022 when Byron was out with an injury.

I’m enough of a statistician to know that a few instances do not make a correlation, and they definitely don’t make causation. However, where there is smoke, there usually is fire. 

Do the Twins’ 2023 playoff hopes actually hinge on this obscure and recent part of baseball’s seasonal grind, and Byron's health/our bullpen's strength? Or does Carlos Correa officially being a Twin “for life” now, as opposed to the “soon to be free agent”, bring enough leadership to buoy the Twins through the inevitable injuries this time?  

I would argue that the soft-science of clubhouse "unity" gets magnified on the road. With the signing and security of locking down Correa and his assistant GM leadership, do the Twins now have a formula for righting this wrong in 2023?

We shall see. 31,759 miles and 14 road trips await the Twins this season. The Twins will start their 2023 campaign on the road in Kansas City and Miami, winnable games to be sure. But the next three journeys take the Twins through the Bronx, Fenway, Cleveland, and Dodgers Stadium, to name a few. Reaching their ultimate goal will depend on holding their own in the face of these early tests. 

Root, root, root for the home team, indeed! But if the Twins' road trips don’t bring them at least 38 wins, you can kiss the playoff dreams goodbye.

 

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[Peter]

Totally agree with you!!! We can’t expect the twins to win every game but rather win series/home that shouldn’t be a problem. On the road yes. Especially last year losing to Cleveland in heartbreaking crushing fashion with leads in 8th/9th innings. I’m starting to think this years team is going to be better then last year. Not expecting World Series but I’ll take division title/breaking 18 game playoff losing streak. I can’t wait for season to start!!! 

[Blyleven2011]

Twins are like a possum , they play dead at home  ( not exciting baseball ) and get killed on the road ...

The players need to step up and have a killer instinct that they can win every game and not be Minnesota nice and say there is always tomorrows game  , every win matters ( the Yankees  instill this in their player ) we should copy them and not Tampa or Oakland  in money ball ...

[terrydactyls]

The 1987 World Champion Twins only won 29 road games.

[Nashvilletwin]

8 minutes ago, Blyleven2011 said:

Twins are like a possum , they play dead at home  ( not exciting baseball ) and get killed on the road ...

That’s a good one - never heard it before. Made me chuckle.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

9 minutes ago, Blyleven2011 said:

 

The players need to step up and have a killer instinct that they can win every game and not be Minnesota nice and say there is always tomorrows game  , every win matters 

I agree Bly. If I heard Gardy or Rocco say this once, I have heard it a hundred times after losses: "It's a long season". Baloney. It is one day at a time, one game at a time, one inning at a time, one pitch at a time. The games in April count as much as the "September pennant race" games. 

[tarheeltwinsfan]

12 minutes ago, terrydactyls said:

The 1987 World Champion Twins only won 29 road games.

Interesting point. I may ask my friend, Mark Davidson, about this. He was on the 87 team.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

Really well written article about a provocative subject. Thanks Steven.

[Blyleven2011]

21 minutes ago, tarheeltwinsfan said:

Interesting point. I may ask my friend, Mark Davidson, about this. He was on the 87 team.

Ask him if he liked playing in the dome or in an open air stadium  ,,,

Twins won 55 games at home that year and the fans rocked the house that gave the twins home field advantage  ...

 

[Dave The Dastardly]

This well-written article makes a case for keeping Buxton packed in cotton for the first half of the season and not let him on the field until after the All-Popular game. That way he might still be around to help clinch a play-off spot on the road over the final months of the season. Or maybe give him Rocco Rest Days for all home games throughout the season and only play Buxton when the team is on the road, the hell with what Dorothy claimed.

It's either one of those options or send a bodyguard out on the field with him if we want Buxton available for the play-offs.

Just thinking out of the Box (one of my favorite taverns).

[Steven Trefz]

 

2 hours ago, terrydactyls said:

The 1987 World Champion Twins only won 29 road games.

The 1987 squad and the 2020 Covid team are the two outliers in Twins history where they made the playoffs with a less than .460 mark on the road.  That 1987 team in particular looks more like a miracle the more I study it!
 

The Twins have also had seasons where they finished above .460 on the road and didn’t make the playoffs: 1962, 1963, 1964, 1966, 1967, 1968, 1971, 1973, 1975, 1976, 1979, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2001, 2005.

The expansion of number of playoff teams obviously tracks through these statistics.  

With the new full-interleague schedule starting this year, combined with the reduced central division scheduling, I think we will see this trend continue forward though as a modern reality.  
 

 

 

[Whitey333]

Yes I just hate it when players, coaches, and managers, poo poo losing games in April.  They say things like it's a marathon not a sprint.  God how I hate that.  Last year's early season losses mostly by Pagan were in that category we were told.  What a bunch of crap.  I know they aren't going to win every game.  But to imply that games in April and may are meaningless only is used by losing teams to try and cover up a poor team with a poor manager.  Go Twins.  We have 16 home games in April.  Hopefully they will take advantage of that and get off to a good start.

[hitterscount]

4 hours ago, terrydactyls said:

The 1987 World Champion Twins only won 29 road games.

Don't believe the 91 team was much better. In each of those WS they lost every road game and were fortunate to have 4 home games. Those were two of the best WS ever played.... the Metrodome was rocking!! 

[stringer bell]

2 hours ago, hitterscount said:

Don't believe the 91 team was much better. In each of those WS they lost every road game and were fortunate to have 4 home games. Those were two of the best WS ever played.... the Metrodome was rocking!! 

‘91 Twins were 44-37 on the road. 
 

The Twins road troubles last year were on both sides of the ball. Late leads given up and few comebacks. They just weren’t very good. 

[Parfigliano]

6 hours ago, hitterscount said:

Don't believe the 91 team was much better. In each of those WS they lost every road game and were fortunate to have 4 home games. Those were two of the best WS ever played.... the Metrodome was rocking!! 

Yup either series on road they lose 4-3.  Truely there is no place like dome.

[nclahammer]

A good look at the road numbers.  The 87 Twins were an anomaly...the stars were aligned for an exciting playoff run, especially at home.  Although I believe they did win the ALCS on the road at Detroit.

[weitz41]

Spitballing here.

Veterans handle MLB road trips better then AAA players 

Could it be that by August 1st we had so many veteran players on the IL and AAA players starting that our road record suffered?

I am curious about the 2019 teams injuries. If I remember correctly they had very few. 

 

[dex8425]

On 1/19/2023 at 8:09 AM, Peter said:

Totally agree with you!!! We can’t expect the twins to win every game but rather win series/home that shouldn’t be a problem. On the road yes. Especially last year losing to Cleveland in heartbreaking crushing fashion with leads in 8th/9th innings. I’m starting to think this years team is going to be better then last year. Not expecting World Series but I’ll take division title/breaking 18 game playoff losing streak. I can’t wait for season to start!!! 

Should be better. Tyler Mahle and Kenta Maeda are better than Dylan Bundy and Chris Archer. The lineup and bullpen are basically the same on paper. Whether guys stay healthy is the big question mark. 

[mac098]

This is well put. If the Twins can maintain a .600 winning percentage at home, there is a good chance they make the playoffs...if they can get a .500 percentage at home (I know its not possible due to the fact that they play 81 home and 81 away, so realistically going 40-41 or 41-40 away we would be okay as long as we get a minimum of 49 wins at home). 

 

So that would leave us around 89/90 and 73/72, which TBH, isn't strong enough to make the playoffs most years, but with a weak AL Central, I think we could win the division. 

[dex8425]

7 hours ago, weitz41 said:

Spitballing here.

Veterans handle MLB road trips better then AAA players 

Could it be that by August 1st we had so many veteran players on the IL and AAA players starting that our road record suffered?

I am curious about the 2019 teams injuries. If I remember correctly they had very few. 

 

The 2019 team had some injuries, not nearly the amount of the 2022 team. In 2019 the rotation was pretty durable, however we lost Pineda for the postseason because of his PED suspension, and Perez had forgotten how to pitch the second half of the year so Dobnak stepped up down the stretch and started game 2 in yankee stadium.  Buxton only played 87 games; he actually played more in 2022. Marwin and Adrianza ended up playing a lot because Sano got hurt. Polanco, Kepler and Rosario were durable. Kepler was a monster in 2019. 

Biggest difference between 2019 and 2022 is the rotation.

In 2022, Joe Ryan led the team in innings with 147.

In 2019: Berrios: 200 innings, Perez 165, Gibson 160, Odorizzi 159, Pineda 146. Rogers, May and Duffey were all really good.