Twins

There was plenty of Twins-related minor league news on Wednesday.

Miguel Sano was named American League Rookie of the Month for the month of August, the first Twin to garner that award since Little Benny Revere in the summer of 2011.

Later in the evening, Terry Ryan announced that Jose Berrios will not be helping the Twins out in the pennant race, instead he’ll head home after the Rochester season and be shut down til next spring. (Yeah, right, The Machine will be working out hard in 10 days, out to prove that he’ll never get tired because he’s, well… a machine.)

Aside from a three-day flurry of moves in early November, the winter has largely been ho-hum for the Twins and their fans. The bullpen? Same. Plouffe and Sano?! Yep. Rotation help? Nada. Mauer back to catcher? Don't you even...

In attempting to re-tool and improve a catastrophic pitching staff, the Twins and their new Chief Baseball Officer Derek Falvey will need to explore every avenue.

Here are a few worth looking into.

Aaron and John accept that the Twins offseason shopping is done, mourn the loss of Alex Kirillloff's 2017 season, share the new keyword to win Twins tickets at KernelNation.com, place their bets on the teams in the AL West, reveal what Aaron does the night before he travels, and drop hints about their new Tuesday Taproom Tour. You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Stitcher or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link.

We're about to find out.

When Derek Falvey was hired to run Minnesota's baseball ops, he brought with him a rep as a pitching guru, partially responsible for constructing the enviable staff in Cleveland. That group, of course, wasn't assembled through big-money free agent signings, but through savvy trades and superior development strategies.

So it comes as no surprise that he's attempting to apply this same model with the Twins. It's why he was hired.

The Twins carried a 3-1 lead into the bottom of the ninth inning thanks to an excellent start by Kyle Gibson, but Gary Sanchez blasted a Fernando Rodney pitch for a three-run homer to walk it off at Yankee Stadium. The victory gave New York a four-game sweep over the Twins, who have now lost their last seven games.

Today was a rather light day for the Minnesota Twins farm system. With the Red Wings game postponed and neither the Lookouts or E-Twins having games, the action was muted at best. Despite some tough losses for both Cedar Rapids and the GCL club, arguably the most notable action came from the transactions yet to be made official

He’s back!

The Twins re-acquired 2017 two-way sensation Chris Gimenez at the waiver trade deadline, and his presence on the roster immediately paid off. Gimenez pitched and hit a home run Sunday.

Shohei Ohtani? Pfft, who needs 'em!?!?!? Read on for the full rundown of everything you need to know (and a bunch of stuff you’d rather forget) from the past seven days.

Every year the Winter Meltdown has included great prizes, and this year is no different, which is one reason we expect tickets to sell out fast after they go on sale here Tuesday at 8AM. This year, Fan HQ is providing both a Jose Berrios signed baseball and an autographed item from our Twins special guest, who is….

The Twins struck an eleventh-hour deadline deal, and their new setup man had an... interesting first week. Minnesota was also hit by an unfortunate rash of key injuries, just as a critical stretch of the schedule looms.

It was a hectic week full of big events. But somehow it all paled in comparison to the theatrics of Nelson Cruz, who carried his incredible homer-hitting clinic from July into August, powering the Twins to a 5-1 week as they maintained their three-game lead over the hard-charging Indians.

Welcome to the final regular-season series of the year! It’s been a fun ride that started with tracking spring training performances and story lines that will soon end with a division title and a dance with another team in the ALDS. At this point, the only thing that the Twins could possibly gain by winning games is potential home-field advantage in the World Series against the Atlanta Braves. But, we are all baseball addicts at heart, so we shall follow each game like normal but without the agony that comes from the potential division implications a loss holds. Also of note; this is the final series in the managing career of Ned Yost who announced recently that he would be retiring after this season. I’m sure Ned will have a hard time buying his own drinks in public as he brought KC their first championship since 1985 when the Royals won it all in 2015.

There’s a certain phrase in the Braun family household that gets tossed around often. We (somewhat) affectionately like to call each other a “fun sucker” if someone does something in the realm of sucking fun. It’s hard to specifically identify what would constitute a reason for such a phrase to be uttered, but when it’s time, we all know. So, allow me to be a fun sucker for a few minutes here.