Twins Notebook 9/14: Twins Travel to Chicago For All-Important Series

Yesterday’s Game Recap

Twins 7, Cleveland 5: Twins Complete Sweep, Shift Focus to White Sox

Today

Twins @ White Sox 7:10 pm CDT

Betting Line: Twins -140, White Sox +120, O/U: 9

Twins Starter: Jose Berrios, RHP 4.40 ERA

Jose Berrios seems to have found his groove over his past four starts. Over that stretch, Berrios has a 2.78 ERA while holding opposing hitters to an OPS of .552. A big reason for this has been Berrios’ improved strikeout to walk ratio. Over his first five starts of the season, Berrios had a K/9 of 8.9 and a BB/9 of 4.8. However, over his last four starts, his K/9 has jumped up to 12.3, while his BB/9 has decreased down to 3.6. This is the perfect time of year for Berrios to have settled into form, as he will likely make just three more starts before the end of the regular season.

This will be Berrios’ third outing this season against the fearsome White Sox lineup. After struggling against them his first time out, Berrios was lights out when they squared off a couple weeks ago, allowing just one run across six brilliant innings. Overall, Berrios has plenty of experience facing this White Sox roster, with seven different hitters having at least 20 career plate appearances against Berrios.

White Sox Starter: Dylan Cease, RHP 3.33 ERA

At a quick glance, it would appear that second-year starter Dylan Cease is have a strong bounce back season after a rough rookie campaign, as he comes into tonight with a 5-2 record to go along with a 3.33 ERA. However, this is the exact reason why advanced metrics were created, as Cease has been blessed with a ton of lady luck to start his season. While Cease has a 3.33 ERA, his FIP and xFIP stand at 5.95 and 5.81, respectively. This is due in large part to Cease’s dreadfully low 5.9 K/9 and a not all that impressive 3.9 BB/9 rate so far this year. Cease has been helped a lot by an opposing BABIP of just .233 and a stranded runner rate of 83.3%. Both of which should expect some regression, which would drastically hurt Cease’s run prevention numbers when that happens.

Cease has yet to face the Twins so far this year, but he got demolished by the Bomba Squad in his two outings against them in 2019. In those two starts, Cease managed to give up 13 earned runs in just seven innings pitched. While three home runs paved the way for some of that production, the Twins main weapon of attack was a relentless barrage of getting on base, as they accumulated 17 hits to go along with four walks in those seven innings against Cease.

Twins Lineup

https://twitter.com/Twins/status/1305621845484470288

Scratch that ...

https://twitter.com/morsecode/status/1305641728754544642

Here are the updates:

News & Notes

- Eddie Rosario, Miguel Sano and Trevor May all appear to be relatively fine after all leaving Sunday’s game early with injuries. With the extreme sense of caution the Twins have had all year, don’t be surprised to see any of them miss a game or two so they can recover.

- Albert Pujols hit his 660th career home run on Sunday, pulling him even with Willie Mays for 5th on the all-time home run list. Pujols will need another 36 home runs to reach Alex Rodriguez for 4th on the career home run list.

- Chicago Cubs starting pitcher Alec Mills threw a no-hitter on Sunday against the Milwaukee Brewers.

Around the AL Central

White Sox 5, Tigers 2

Royals 11, Pirates 0

1. CWS 30-16 (+77)

2. MIN 30-18 1.0 GB (+48)

3. CLE 26-21 4.5 GB (+31)

4. DET 20-26 10.0 GB (-58)

5. KC 20-28 11.0 GB (-21)