Twins

Brandon Kintzler was unavailable, so it was up to Taylor Rogers to protect a one-run lead. It would have been his first professional save on any level … would have been. Rogers walked the leadoff man, then gave up a walk-off homer to the next batter, Rajai Davis.

Cleveland extended its winning streak to nine games, though the Royals’ winning streak was snapped. The Twins are seven games back in the division and four back in the wild card race.

In the last week, we have considered potential contract extensions for Brian Dozier and Byron Buxton. Today, we will attempt to consider what a possible long-term extension might look like for Third Baseman/Designated Hitter Miguel Sano.

Sano came up and showed his promise in the 2nd half of the 2015 season. He struggled in his sophomore season of 2016, a struggle that still included 25 home runs. In 2017, he was having his best season yet, but it came to an end six weeks too early when he fouled a ball off of his shin, causing a stress reaction.

While there are obvious short term and long-term concerns with Sano, it is very clear that he can be a game-changer in the middle of any lineup in the game. He’ll likely set strikeout records, but he can also produce like few can.

Do you smell that? No, it isn’t Ervin Santana and his patented “smell baseball” routine. Minnesota made a splash on the trade market over the weekend to help fill in for Santana while he starts the year on the DL. However, new Twins pitcher Jake Odorizzi struggled through different parts of 2017.

Can the Twins find a way to get rid of the bad Odor? It might be Izzi…

For the past number of years, Fernando Rodney has come on to close baseball games for any number of big league teams. He’s been asked to pitch one inning, get three outs, and preserve the lead for his respective ball club. Over the years, he’s added the shooting arrow celebrating and a new number to his age tally. What he’s patented during his 16 major league seasons though, is the Fernando Rodney Experience. On Thursday it caused a lot of Twins fans to lose their collective minds.

Since May 18^th, a span of six starts, no opposing team had scored more than three earned runs off Kyle Gibson, and five of those games were of the quality start variety. That changed on the south side of Chicago on Wednesday as the White Sox racked up eleven hits and a 5-0 lead when his night was done.

As we march into mid-January, with spring training suddenly only weeks away, the Twins' roster is coming into focus. Through various avenues, they've supplemented both the offense and the bullpen.

If they are to address the rotation, it's looking less likely they'll do so through a major-league contract. That doesn't necessarily rule out an interesting addition though.

Aaron and John talk about Joe Mauer weekend at Target Field, the latest batch of absurd Twins hitting numbers, another week spent thinking ahead to bullpen trades, the Twins' remaining schedule, sports betting and wearables, and Rocco Baldelli vs. Tom Kelly. You can listen by downloading us from iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, iHeartRadio or find it at GleemanAndTheGeek.com. Or just click this link.

It’s December 12, the snow is falling in Minneapolis, and the Minnesota Twins contingent is headed home from the Winter Meetings. They brought back a pitcher, and signed their backup catcher, but impact pitching hasn’t landed, and assets dwindled. Now, an ask for patience.

I had been wanting to write about the topic of labeling athletes as injury-prone for quite some time. It’s a label that is bandied about willy-nilly whenever an athlete has a difficult time remaining on their field of play due to recurrent injuries and I believe that it is time to stop using the phrase that never should have been uttered in the first place.

It is natural to focus on dates and locations, but those were not the important part of last week’s ESPN report that MLB and MLBPA had met with CDC, HHS and other health care officials to discuss a path for MLB games' restart. The important part is that if those three stakeholders – MLB, MLBPA, and federal health officials - see a path, then who is going to stop the return of baseball?

Baseball’s almost back! Let’s speculate!

The Twins and Royals will meet up for their final series of 2020 beginning tonight. The Twins are 3-4 against KC this season with a -1 run differential so hopefully they can turn it around tonight.