stringer bell

Too bad for Rooker. He has looked good at the plate in his limited big league at-bats. That said, he may have been on his way back to St. Paul (either him or Wade) with Kepler being ready to come off the Injured List. 21 plate appearances isn't enough to know how good of a hitter he is or will be. I will say that his stint was encouraging, but doesn't make him a centerpiece for future Twins teams.

Wade's skill set is not as desirable as it would be in other eras. If he had more power or was a true center fielder, I'd like him more for the Twins. They have a lot of LH batting corner outfielder types in the top of their system, so he may end up playing (and succeeding) for someone else.

I see the White Sox as having the better future of the two teams competing with the Twins for the division title this year, but I don't think they are as good a team as the Twins right now. Obviously, they are in first place and four of their players have been outstanding--Anderson, Abreu, Robert and Jiménez--but I don't think their pitching is very deep, nor their bench. Cleveland has to decide what to do with Lindor (almost certainly a Mookie Betts type of trade) and they just haven't developed much of an attack. They have had tremendous luck and success developing pitchers. Former Twin Carl Willis must be some kind of magician. They bring up middle of the road prospects and they become first tier pitchers. For this season, the enduring image I'll have of Chicago unless they do something memorable from here on in, is the way they kicked the ball around at Target Field. Poor defense and poor fundamentals. I know the Twins have made their share of defensive mistakes, but nothing like what I saw out of the White Sox. To me, that is what makes them a step less formidable than Cleveland and still not as good as the Twins. Of course, if Chicago wins the series with the Twins this week, they'll likely win the division. I don't think they'd sustain over a full season, but we'll never know about that.

Reminiscent of Cleveland's domination of bad teams last year, particularly Detroit. I'm not convinced Chicago is that good, but the Twins will have to beat them at their park to secure the lead.

Cleveland looks like they'll be the wild card almost for sure. They Twins are 3.5 ahead and have a tiebreaker advantage. It's pretty hard to make up 4.5 games in only 13 games. They trail Chicago by 4.5, but get to host the White Sox later this month. Now the Twins get the White Sox in Chicago. A split gives the Twins the tiebreaker advantage and three of four gives them the division lead and a tiebreaker advantage. It should be fun!

Winner!!!

Rogers was warming before Eddie homered. As long as he was warmed, he was coming in.

How about a 4-5-3 doubleplay?

The Twins do plenty of watching on fly balls and a lot of times they don't really bust it to first base on "routine" grounders. If you're going to make a judgment on that, I don't think there is one who is more guilty than another.

I don't want to be an Eddie hater, but that is Buxton's ball all the way.

Still six outs to get.

Yes. I think Gonzalez likes the whole infield of Cleveland's team. He and Sanó were acting as peacemakers in Friday's night's dustup.

Obviously, I hope May is OK, nothing more than a tweak. Dude faced four batters without a K? What's up with that?

Agree. And when the Twins have asked for a review on anything else, they seem to have lost them all.

OUT!!!

Seriously? I want Kepler up there 10 times out of 10 versus a right hander.

Two singles and then a run scored not by hitting a home run. Weird stuff.

Even when he's making outs, Gonzalez is hitting the ball harder in this series.

Two straight singles, what's that now?

Good job Trevor!

Probably the right call to bring in May, but bringing in a guy who has given up a lot of homers, with two on and the tying run at the plate?

I expect that there will be more viewership now that the football game is over.

Extreme examples today. Cleveland is finding grass with many balls hit in play, while the Twins haven't had a ball in play go for a hit, and yet here we are.

Twins BABIP--.000!

Great job Caleb!