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  • MIN 1, HOU 0: Let’s Go Crazy

    Tom Froemming

    By Tom Froemming

    All across Twins Territory, fans seem to be doing their best to contain their excitement. Their mantra has been it’s only April, it’s only the Orioles, we still don’t know much about this Twins team.

    That all could change over the course of this week. A big performance against the Astros and the Yankees would make it difficult for even the most reserved Midwesterner to temper excitement. The Twins got things off to a great start Monday evening.

    Image courtesy of © Jesse Johnson-USA TODAY Sports

    Twins Video

    Box Score

    Odorizzi: 7.0 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, 66.3% strikes

    Home Runs: Adrianza (1)

    Multi-Hit Games: None

    WPA of +0.1: Odorizzi .473, Parker .170, Rogers .124, Adrianza .123

    WPA of -0.1: Rosario -.100

    Win429.png

    (chart via FanGraphs)

    There are certain things, even in the early going, that can give you certain vibes as a fan that your team may be on the verge of something special. Certain events just hit you and let those “this is our year” vibes to start flowing.

    Jake Odorizzi and the Twins bullpen shutting out the Houston Astros lineup would be one of those things. Ehire Adrianza hitting a home run off Justin Verlander for the only run of a game would be another one. Both those things happened tonight.

    It took Odorizzi just 86 pitches to get through seven innings. That’s a solid mark for any pitcher, but Odo isn’t exactly known for his efficiency. He got 13 swinging strikes on those 86 pitches, improving upon the career-high rate he carried into this outing. Odorizzi has gotten swinging strikes on 13% of his pitches this year. Last season, only nine qualified starters had a swinging strike rate above 13%, and Odorizzi was at 10.2%.

    Not surprisingly, the strikeout rates are also encouraging for Odorizzi in the early going of this season. He's now struck out exactly a quarter of the batters he's faced so far. That would represent a career high and a nice boost from his 22.8 K% from last year.

    Odorizzi needed a grand total of just 21 pitches to get through the third through fifth innings. He ran into trouble in the sixth, issuing a one-out walk followed by a single. We’ve seen him unravel in similar situations before, but he struck out both Carlos Correa and Yuli Gurriel to end the threat.

    While Odorizzi was cruising, Justin Verlander was also carving up the Twins. But there was a different look to the lineup tonight. They entered this game with a league-low 3.76 pitches per plate appearances. Tonight, they had a batter work an at-bat of six pitches or more in each of Verlander’s six innings. The longest of those was a 10-pitch walk for Max Kepler to lead off the first inning. Eddie Rosario had a nine-pitch at-bat that ended in a strikeout, and one of those longer plate appearances produced the game’s only run.

    In the third inning, Ehire Adrianza fell behind Verlander 1-2. He fouled off the fourth pitch to extend the at-bat, then watched two balls go by. Ehire deposited pitch No. 7 into the stands.

    https://twitter.com/fsnorth/status/1123023350429732864

    Verlander was nasty, but all that work resulted in him needing 100 pitches to get through six innings. He turned things over to the bullpen at that point. Unfortunately, there’s not much of a drop off. The Houston bullpen held the Twins scoreless for two innings.

    Taylor Rogers looked incredibly nasty in a scoreless eighth inning before Blake Parker took care of business in the ninth. Parker gave up a leadoff single, but managed to induce a double play ball from the next batter.

    Postgame With Baldelli

    https://twitter.com/fsnorth/status/1123055528349802496

    Bullpen Usage

    Here’s a quick look at the number of pitches thrown by the bullpen over the past five days:

    Bullpen429.png

    Next Three Games

    Tue vs. HOU, 6:40 pm CT (Pineda-Cole)

    Wed vs. HOU, 7:10 pm CT (Perez-McHugh)

    Thu vs. HOU, 12:10 pm CT (Berrios-Peacock)

    Last Game

    MIN 4, BAL 1: Kepler Sets Tone, Gibby Brings It Home

    Attachments:
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    Follow Tom Froemming on Twitter: TFTwins

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    Featured Comments

    Dman

    Dman 7,149

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

    I had this game penciled in as a loss before it even began.  I kept waiting for Odo to have one of his Odo innings in the 5th then the 6th then the 7th and it never happened.  Then I waited for the bullpen to mess his great pitching performance up and it never happened.  When the game was over I sat in quiet disbelief wondering if what happened really just happened.  Baseball is a crazy game.

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    Tom Froemming

    Tom Froemming 9,895

  • Twins Daily Staff

    • Posted

     

    I could be wrong, but I remember reading somewhere that those improvements actually started last year, and that you could see a nice trend on him last fall.  

     

    I'm beginning to think he's turned a corner. If so, great find by our front office. 

    His last two months of the season were weird. It was almost as if he was trying to go back to more of a pitch to contact approach. The first four months he gave up an .802 OPS but his K% was 24.0 and his swinging strike rate was 11%. That produced a 4.58 ERA.

     

    Then those last two months he limited opponents to just a .610 OPS, but his strikeout rate dropped to 20.0% and he was only getting swinging strikes 8% of the time. He had a 4.30 ERA over those final 10 starts. So it certainly appears after the team raised the white flag at the trade deadline Odorrizi started working on some things. Not all of those adjustments yielded great results -- he had a 5.06 ERA in September -- but maybe he discovered some things to build upon.

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    Riverbrian

    Riverbrian 32,096

  • Old-Timey Member

    • Posted

    I had this game penciled in as a loss before it even began. I kept waiting for Odo to have one of his Odo innings in the 5th then the 6th then the 7th and it never happened. Then I waited for the bullpen to mess his great pitching performance up and it never happened. When the game was over I sat in quiet disbelief wondering if what happened really just happened. Baseball is a crazy game.

    It is a crazy game. That’s why I never pencil in losses.

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    MMMordabito

    MMMordabito 3,585

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    Was that the best game Odorizzi has pitched as a Twin?  I seem to remember one very good outing last year, but not the details.  And wasn't it fun watching a real pitchers duel?  Loved it!

     

    Late last season he had a no-hitter through 7 against the Yankees and ended up being pulled in the 8th after losing the no-hitter ... Twins still won, but the game was late enough in the season, that it didn't matter.

     

    I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

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    PharmerJack

    PharmerJack 14

  • Provisional Member

    • Posted

    Damn that was fun to watch!

     

    This might be the type of game that people point to as "boring" because there aren't gobs of homers but man that was great. The two starters throwing slime in a tight game was great to watch but Jolly Rogers coming in and keelhauling through the 8th was fantastic.

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    jmlease1

    jmlease1 6,071

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

    Odorizzi was terrific last night, really fun to watch. I'm really happy for him to have gotten through 7, and not having one of his "cruising along, until we hit the 5th, which takes 35 pitches to survive, oh great, now he's at 94 pitches starting the 6th" outings. He really did a nice job finishing off hitters last night.

     

    Twins hitters battled against Verlander, and didn't get a lot of great results for it but you have to think that a lot of those balls they were fouling off are the sort of swings resulting in hard-hit balls against other pitchers. No problem with the approach.

     

    And Marwin may be still scuffling at the plate, but he sure doesn't take it with him into the field. That play he made hustling into RF for a sliding back-to-the-plate catch was fantastic.

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    rdehring

    rdehring 3,816

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    Late last season he had a no-hitter through 7 against the Yankees and ended up being pulled in the 8th after losing the no-hitter ... Twins still won, but the game was late enough in the season, that it didn't matter.

     

    I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

    Thanks, that was the game I was thinking of, just couldn't recall the details.  Which is best, flip a coin.  Now, lets see him back this up with more starts like last night.

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    rdehring

    rdehring 3,816

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    A 1-0 pitcher's duel may be boring for some casual baseball fans who just want to watch homeruns... for someone who works many games at Target Field, a 2 hour-15 minute game is wonderful (particularly when the Twins win.)

     

    Do you get paid by the hour?  Or by the game?

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    Otto von Ballpark

    Otto von Ballpark 20,320

  • Community Leader

    • Posted

     

    A 1-0 pitcher's duel may be boring for some casual baseball fans who just want to watch homeruns... for someone who works many games at Target Field, a 2 hour-15 minute game is wonderful (particularly when the Twins win.)

    Time of game was actually 2:31, although it started 30 minutes earlier than usual (6:40) so it probably felt shorter.

     

    Loved the game last night (especially the result), but it sort of highlights the modern pace of play / game length problem, from my perspective. No replay challenges, no mid-inning pitching changes, lots of strikes, very few baserunners (Astros just 6 batters over the minimum, Twins 5), home team didn't bat in the bottom of the ninth -- absolute perfect conditions for the quickest game reasonably possible -- -yet the game still took 2:31.

     

    That's the baseline for why the average game is 3:04 and can feel like it's dragging at times -- because the baseline pace/time is already stretched so far, it can't really tolerate any further stretching. And that's why I'd love to finally see a pitch clock in MLB, rather than a 3 batter minimum or other more complicated changes. If we could pull this baseline down to 2:15, I think the average game would feel a lot crisper (and those 7:10 game starts would end by 10:00 on average). Pull the baseline down to 2:00 and that would be even better, of course, but I'll take what I can get.

     

    Sadly, it seems like the pitch clock is just a negotiating tool between MLB/MLBPA, rather than a likely implementation, at this point.

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    Doomtints

    Doomtints 2,816

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

    I knew the Twins would win this game. Why?

    I saw some pundits/journalists on CBS Sports saying yeah the Twins are good, but the Astros are better, and Verlander is the best, thus predicting the Twins would lose this game for sure. ;)

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    Buddy Holly

    Buddy Holly 79

  • Provisional Member

    • Posted

    Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

    When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

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    Clear

    Clear 18

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

    Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

    When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

     

    Winning via the long ball counts all the same in the standings

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    Doomtints

    Doomtints 2,816

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

    We don't know yet if the Yankees are a good team this year. They had the second easiest schedule in the league so far, twice as easy as the Twins who also had a very easy schedule.

     

    We will have a better picture in another six weeks.

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    KFEY93

    KFEY93 302

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

    When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

    Boston is playing like garbage, not worried about them yet. We will win the Toronto series, we have already proven we can beat Cleveland. Tampa is the only ones that scare me, with their pitching but their offense is not great. We can compete and beat all the teams you listed. Just have to go out and do it. 

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    Otto von Ballpark

    Otto von Ballpark 20,320

  • Community Leader

    • Posted

     

    Winning via the long ball counts all the same in the standings

    Obviously, but we're probably not going to finish with 312 HR for the season like our current pace suggests. I think the poster is saying that eventually we'll need to find other ways to score if we want to maintain this winning percentage -- but I think we should be capable of doing that. Our BB% is low, but so is our K%, and we're not getting any BABIP luck right now either.

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    Otto von Ballpark

    Otto von Ballpark 20,320

  • Community Leader

    • Posted

     

    We don't know yet if the Yankees are a good team this year. They had the second easiest schedule in the league so far, twice as easy as the Twins who also had a very easy schedule.

    I think the Yankees series will be a bit of a test, beyond team quality. It will be interesting to see the mindset/approach/attitude of this team vs the Yankees, under Baldelli as opposed to Gardenhire and Molitor. Although it might be hard to tell right away -- we actually rocked the Yankees in Molitor's debut against them, and almost won the next game too until Glen Perkins met John Ryan Murphy...

     

    Of course, the next 3 games with Houston might set the tone entering the Yankees series too!

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    Circus Boy

    Circus Boy 2,494

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    I think last night was a bigger deal ... "To be the best, you gotta beat the best" and all that good stuff

    Golly, not to brag or anything, but I coined that saying in a lede for an AP story on a Big Sky basketball game in 1991. It was picked up by West Coast TV guys in a hurry, then was an ESPN catch phrase that spring and summer. It became the team version of Ric Flair's signature saying, "To be the man, ya gotta beat the man!"

     

    I still get royalties, by the way. 

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    Dantes929

    Dantes929 4,529

  • Verified Member

    • Posted

     

    Get Back in the Car Kids! Until the Twins beat the Yankees they are average. Then there is Boston, Toronto, Tampa Bay, and Cleveland. It's April, stay in the car and enjoy the ride, but I wouldn't schedule vacation for October yet unless you like to duck hunt.

    When the Twins start showing they can score runs without HR, it will be a good sign. Chris Russo said the other day, Hey can the Yankees keep it going and then he looked at the schedule and said the Twins are coming to town!  I agree last night was good baseball, but I want to see more against good teams. Beat the Yankee's next week!

    Given the choice I would bank a 3-3 record in the next 6 games and I don't care if it came via a sweep of the Astros and getting swept by the Yankees or vice versa.      Go .500 against the good teams and beat up on the bad teams.   Its a formula but it bloody well works.

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    Otto von Ballpark

    Otto von Ballpark 20,320

  • Community Leader

    • Posted

     

    Golly, not to brag or anything, but I coined that saying in a lede for an AP story on a Big Sky basketball game in 1991. It was picked up by West Coast TV guys in a hurry, then was an ESPN catch phrase that spring and summer. It became the team version of Ric Flair's signature saying, "To be the man, ya gotta beat the man!"

     

    I still get royalties, by the way. 

    "If this is anyone but Ric Flair, you're stealing my bit!" :)

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    Buddy Holly

    Buddy Holly 79

  • Provisional Member

    • Posted

    I agree 5-5 against the Astro's, Yankee's, and Blue Jays is good, but you got to beat the teams in the East to get respect and start to change the culture if you want to take the next step. Cleveland still has the best Starters in AL and Lindor is back. 

    You can't continue to win with only hitting HR. You got to manufacture runs when conditions dictate it. Good teams can do both, besides scoring 5 runs without hitting a HR, puts more pressure on the pitcher and defense. You have to be able to do both. I haven't seen a lot of " Small Ball". I like the winning, but sometimes you got to play the game smart late in the game. That is my point.

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