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Multiple unvaccinated Twins players must sit out this weekend’s series in Toronto due to Canada’s COVID policies. While the medical community almost universally hails the efficacy of the vaccines, the worst doctor we could find thinks the Twins are getting a raw deal.
Dr. Gary Van Lowe, a retired family physician from Chanhassen, says the players (Max Kepler, Caleb Thielbar, Emilio Pagan, and Trevor Megill)  are probably in better shape than their vaccinated teammates.
“I was doing my own research just this morning,” said Van Lowe, “And realvaccinetruth.biz said the vaccines have little microchips in them that allows the government to turn you into a human microwave. I got right up off the toilet to see if any of that was in the newspaper. Not a word.”
The 61-year-old, whose frequent malpractice settlements earned him the nickname “Mal” from Fairview Southdale's attorneys, said the lack of further media coverage points to a larger conspiracy.
“I don’t think they’re doing this just to screw over the Twins in a critical road series,” said Van Lowe, nursing his “seventh or eighth” Mich Golden Light on the 17th tee box at Deer Run in Victoria. “Could it be to mess with the Vikings and Wild, too? Good luck finding that out in the Red Star (sic) from Michael Bland (sic).”
Van Lowe, who left medicine in 2015 after a series of lurid sexual harassment accusations from fellow doctors, nurses, and the entire front of house staff at the Eden Prairie Buca di Beppo, now runs a medical consultancy firm for insurance companies looking to deny benefits.
“The jury is still out on this vaccine,” he said, wobbling over a putt on 17. “All I know is that Betty White was perfectly healthy before she got the jab. Makes you think.”
Van Lowe ended the interview in order to ask the beer cart driver if she needed a ride home.

Baldelli had the makings of a slam-dunk hire in 2019, when he became the youngest recipient of Manager of the Year in history, leading the Twins to a historic 101-win season. He followed with another division title in the COVID-shortened 2020 season. 
One would think such an impressive start to his managerial career would earn the guy a bit of leeway in the eyes of fans. Turns out, not so much. 
While experiencing his first rocky year at the helm, Rocco was routinely derided by a large portion of the fanbase and columnist hive in 2021's last-place debacle. Never mind he was supplied by the front office with Alex Colomé as his closer and the Happ-maker combo as his rotation reinforcements. Never mind dealing with a rotten hand injury-wise. 
Baldelli took major heat nonetheless. It's the name of the game.
As this 2022 season got off to similarly ugly start, with a 4-8 record two weeks in, fans on Twitter were calling for Rocco's head and a certain desperate-for-attention local media outlet was hilariously attempting to manufacture a manager controversy. 
Since that 4-8 start, Baldelli's Twins are 17-7. They're winning tight games. They're playing far cleaner, crisper ball than opponents. And they're bouncing back from adversity.
Tactically, Baldelli has been pressing the right buttons and his decision have paid off time and time again. Here are three examples from Monday's 3-1 victory:
1: Chris Archer pulled after four innings.
It wasn't an obvious call by any means. Archer had allowed only one run on two hits over four innings. He was at just 62 pitches when Baldelli made the decision to pull him. The Twins were in the midst of a stretch with nine games in nine days. They could've tried to squeeze another inning or two.
The skipper did not want to see Archer face Oakland's lineup for a third time and that was absolutely the right call. Yennier Canó came in and mowed down the next two frames, giving hitters a very different look from the starter.
Griffin Jax followed with two scoreless frames, and then Tyler Duffey closed things out in a clean ninth. Another shutout showing from the relief corps.
Minnesota's bullpen, despite losing one of the best relievers in baseball on the eve of Opening Day, has been phenomenal. Elite by any measure. Elite! Who would've expected this based on the personnel we saw forming this unit?
Twins relief pitchers – from Canó to Jax to Joe Smith to Jhoan Duran to Emilio Pagán and beyond – are getting it done. Rocco is putting them in spots to succeed, as has been his trademark. His bullpen ranked third in the majors in WAR in 2019, and second in 2020.
Baldelli quietly has an argument as the best bullpen manager in baseball.
2: Small ball pays off in the 5th inning.
I'm not a big fan of small-ball tactics generally, and based on his tendencies I think it's safe to say Baldelli feels the same. (I mean, that 2019 team was basically a giant middle-finger to small ball as a concept.)
But both of us could agree that it made sense to take such an approach in the fifth inning of a 1-1 game after Royce Lewis drew a leadoff walk. Nick Gordon, the #9 hitter who entered with a paltry .596 OPS, stepped in and got the bunt call. He executed, bringing up the team's best hitter with one out and a man in scoring position.
Byron Buxton? Oh, you know he executed. 
Even if it hadn't worked out, bunting with Gordon there is a move that simply made sense. Baldelli has shown he'll go that route when it's warranted. You wonder if the dead-ball trend might compel this calculating manager to keep adjusting in that direction.
3: Buxton was on the field.
There's been a whole bunch of grumbling lately about the team's "kid-gloves treatment" of Buxton. (Much of it, you'll be shocked to learn, coming from the aforementioned desperate-for-attention outlet.) Apparently it is now controversial to take a cautious approach in a 162-game season with your vitally important superstar who also happens to be banged up, and maybe the most injury-prone player in the league. 
Yes, Baldelli and the Twins have opened up about their intentions to manage Buxton's workload this year in hopes of keeping him off the injured list. Their plan has been successful so far, in every way. Buxton has avoided the IL – despite a few scares that continue to affect him – and the Twins are six games above .500, leading the division, even with him playing only two-thirds of the time.
Winning the division and having Buxton healthy for the playoffs should be this team's utmost aspiration. It's a combination they haven't yet been able to achieve yet. Right now, Baldelli has the Twins on track to do both. And people are still complaining. SMH.
Some of us appreciate you, Rocco, and see the things you're doing to help this team exceed expectations. Many won't. But that's the name of the game.

The Twins’ first ten games of the season are against teams that won 90 or more games last year. The Mariners added Jesse Winker, Robbie Ray, and uber-prospect Julio Rodríguez to a talented roster that lost only 72 games in 2021. The Dodgers, baseball’s premier team, signed superstar Freddie Freeman. The heart of the Red Sox lineup is as dangerous as any, and the Twins must face them in their home-opening series at Fenway. Tough sledding. 
No one is crying for the Twins. The team insisted they were trying to compete this year, and if you can’t hang with the best teams, you have no business making a run to the postseason. The Twins’ most-winnable series of April is a three-game set at Kauffman Stadium next week, but the Royals have always played the Twins tough, especially in Kansas City. 
The good news for a Twins club needing a solid start is that May lightens up considerably. Four games in Baltimore, six games against the now-lowly Athletics, and 13 straight games against the Royals and Tigers await. The Twins, if they are a real contender this year, should be able to handle most of those matchups. It’s how they won 101 games in 2019. They'll have to do it without Alex Kirilloff and Jorge Alcala, at least for now. 
The Twins ended their season extremely early last year. They dug a hole so deep (14-28 record) before the summer months even arrived. It’s okay to find your footing early, and it would be understandable for the Twins to scuffle a hair in the first half with young starters on the rise. There’s a stark difference, though, between scuffling and sinking. The Twins have to remain around .500 through April. 
The goal: 11-11 or 10-12 by the end of the Tampa Bay series on May 1st. It’s a relatively low bar, but April rivals August as the Twins’ most challenging month. If they can weather the storm, they should be in a good spot when the calendar flips to April. Of course, they still have to play and win those lighter games.
The Twins project to win between 80 and 86 games this year. Taking care of business against visibly-inferior teams (Royals, A’s, Orioles) is essential, but so is managing the tough stretches. The difference between 11-11 April and an 8-14 April is massive. If we manage expectations, the Twins should be shooting for a record that’s five or six games above .500 by the All-Star Break. They have the ammunition to add at the deadline and make a push in August and September. 
The Twins will show us glimpses of who they are as soon as this weekend at Fenway. Split or win the series, and things are looking up. Lose three out of four or get swept, and the confidence will continue to dwindle. You are your record, after all. 

Starting from the basics, all five of the founders were born and raised around Minnesota. Their childhoods played an influential role in their love of the Twins. 
 
Seth: My dad played baseball and softball, and we watched games on TV together sometimes too. Kirby Puckett debuted when I was eight and I was hooked on the Twins for life. 
Brock: I was ten years old when the Twins made a surprise run at the postseason in 1987. It suddenly became fashionable to like the Twins and I HAD to have one of the new “M” hats the team wore that year (in retrospect, I hate that M design).
Nick: My parents definitely instilled a love of the game in me. We used to frequently catch the bus on Bloomington Ave to go catch Twins games at the Metrodome. Baseball has also always been my favorite sport to play — from tee-ball through high school. 
John: Starting at about seven years old, I started listening to every Twins game on the radio, often while throwing a tennis ball against a garage door to pretend I was fielding it. 
Parker: My parents would tell me that I had some MLB sticker book as a toddler and they would trot me out as a party favor in front of their friends, and they’d quiz me on team names. Supposedly I had them down pat.
 
Each founder also dabbled in content creation and entrepreneurship throughout their teenage years. Seth wanted to own a sports card shop (although he preferred buying them to selling them), Nick created his own newspaper called “The Daily Mouse”, which he sold door to door, and Brock was always working on a new project, mostly artistic endeavors. Most commonly, each spent innumerable hours consuming Twins coverage, which was limited to mostly newspaper and radio in the 1990s. However, baseball coverage was often a footnote to football and basketball. This lack of content availability led Nick, Seth, Parker, and John to start writing and blogging in the early 2000s. 
As some of the only independent Twins’ writers, meeting one another was fate waiting to happen. 
 
Seth: John and I exchanged some e-mails when I started blogging in May 2003, I believe the first time we met in person at the state fair in maybe 2005 or 2006. We had done some two-minute Twins spots with Rita Maloney on WCCO, and we were invited to their booth at the state fair. Or was it when John let me write for the Gameday magazine and help sell them outside the Metrodome? There were a lot of Twins bloggers and we often linked to each others' sites.
Nick: I don’t remember exactly how I met these guys, other than that it happened kind of organically because we were all writing about the team. When John recruited me to write for the Gameday program, sold outside of the Metrodome, that was definitely an inflection point. It made me realize there was a more serious business concept behind this hobby. 
Parker: I think I started writing about the Twins in 2006 after my first kid was born. I had a lot of time at home and not a lot of money. I’d watch a game and chart stuff like swinging strikes and other things. At some point, I got connected with Seth and Aaron Gleeman. John’s TwinsGeek site linked to other Twins blogs, so I remember reaching out to him to have him post mine. Bonnes asked me to write an article for a GameDay program (my Mom took a copy of that article and had it framed, it felt like such a huge deal then). I know there were bloggers getting together in various capacities, but I remember pushing for us to get together to drink beer and watch games. 
John: I started writing about the Twins in 2002 and at the time, nobody else was really doing that locally. I remember the rest of us getting together kind of organically. Someone would start a Twins blog and we would reach out and keep in touch online. The outing that we decided to really work together was arranged by Parker in 2007. 
Brock: In 2005 or so, I launched the Battle Your Tail Off forum. From that forum, I met Nick Nelson and was later introduced to John, Seth, and Parker when we started talking about merging my forum into Twins Daily, which had just launched a month or two prior.
 
Although the spark was instantaneous, it took another five years and more beers to put their brands together into one. Throughout the 2000s, each individual grew their own name and following in the Twins’ sphere. During this, the idea of a collaborative effort started to float around. 
 
Parker: We had a couple of group projects including an Offseason Primer ebook and the Star Tribune’s TwinsCentric blog that we had worked together on, but we also kept our separate blogs. It was like a trial run to see if we could all function together. 
John: Seth and Nick talked about how we came together to produce some content, but that wasn’t when we decided to do the website. Between 2007 and 2011, we did produce a lot together: pdfs that we sold directly, some hard copy annual programs that we produced for Maple Street Press, and also we often copied and pasted stories from our individual blogs to a blog we had at StarTribune.com. But the site wasn’t a thought until 2011. 
Nick: We went to the Swarzak game, and wandered over to nearby Dan Kelly’s Pub for postgame drinks, where we started hashing out ideas for a collective plan to move forward. The rest, as they say, is history.
Parker: If you want to make it clean, sure, it was the Swarzak debut game at the Metrodome. We had a small group of bloggers and we went out afterward and did a blood oath to put together a daily Twins website. 
John: Fox Sports had asked us to combine our sites, but it was subscription-based site, and that made us a little uncomfortable. So I researched options. Rob Litt, who runs GopherHole.com, tutored me in running a site based purely on ad revenue. I found a software package that could do a lot of what we wanted so for about $1,300. So we sold a pdf, used all the money to buy the software, and I programmed the modifications. We tested it, set up a writing schedule for the four of us, and launched it when pitchers and catchers reported.
 
And like the Big Bang Theory, Twins Daily was born. While the first name iteration suggested was TwinsCentric, Nick (or Seth, up for debate) ultimately came up with the catchy moniker used today. 
Right away, the website took off like wildfire. Just in the first week, Twins Daily built an impressive following. In the first five weeks, there were 1,100 registered users, with nearly 500 regularly contributing through discussion threads and posts, and over half a million page views. For a small-market team with hobby writers, this was an unprecedented feat. 
Over the first year, organic growth continued, and the site was redesigned for better user experiences. 
 
Brock: A funny story… the four of them were *very* proud of the website. I hated it, heh. In fact, I was so aggravated just looking at it that I redesigned their logo without asking (I didn’t even know John, Parker, or Seth at this point), sent it to Nick, and basically said “get that da**ed ugly thing off the site and replace it with this”. Right off the bat, my first large project was redesigning the site and adding new features. 
 
As the community grew, a fan-favorite event emerged. 
 
John: The first Winter Meltdown was unofficial, where we just bought a keg at Hubert’s. That was Parker’s idea, and I think it was kind of a shared event with DiamondCentric, which was his (and Brock’s) company that made t-shirts. We were shocked 100+ people showed up, including a lot of media.
So the next year, we had it more formally, called it the first annual, and included Gleeman & The Geek. It was at Mason’s Barre, which is now The Gold Room. The first speaker was Scott Erickson, which ended up being a legendary night because he stayed and hung out with everyone for several hours. I think we had about 200 people, which packed the place. 

Although the Winter Meltdowns and the website grew in popularity, there were ebbs and flows along the way. Not surprisingly, they often coincided with the success of the Twins. One of the highest points in viewership and engagement was after the 2019 Bomba Squad season. However, a small global pandemic put a wrench into things, and the drop was precipitous. Fans had much more important things to worry about. Ad revenue, traffic, and morale came to a screeching halt. For any business, this is detrimental. The once-flourishing community was lifeless.
However, the Twins Daily writers and founders rallied. The writers continued to produce daily content, and Seth, Nick, John, and Brock continue to find innovative ways to rally the community. From virtual interviews to TikToks, these entrepreneurs had to pivot to navigate the unknown. Regardless of how dire the situation got, they never stopped paying their writers for their contributions. Although monetization is a key challenge, providing a springboard for writers is at the forefront of the founders’ goals. 
Although the current state of baseball is dire, the Fab Five have a lot to be proud of with what they’ve built in the past ten years. When asked whether Twins Daily is what they envisioned ten years ago, it was a resounding no across the board. None of them predicted that Twins Daily would become not only a large, passionate community but also a legitimate business instead of a modest side hustle. 
To close, for any fans of the podcast How I Built This by Guy Raz, each founder was asked how much of their success can be attributed to luck and skill. They all agreed that while luck played a factor, a lot of hustle and follow through contributed to the creation of the Twins Daily that we all love so much.
Thank you for reading, and thank you John, Nick, Parker, Brock, and Seth for all that you’ve done. 

Ahh, the 2012 season. Almost as ugly as our website looked back then. I mean look at it! You'd think we launched in the late '90s. 
Meanwhile, the Twins were taking it back to the late '90s with their play on the field, where a 96-loss disaster hammered home a cold reality: 2011's collapse was no blip on the radar. Nevertheless, this season gave us some memorable moments – both good and bad – and several were captured in the five most popular articles of Twins Daily's inaugural year.
5. Twins Trade Denard Span for Nationals' 2011 First Round Pick
By Parker Hageman
Ten years ago, Twins had an abundance of center fielders and a major need for pitching. (Sound familiar?) In an effort to rejuvenate the pitching pipeline, Terry Ryan traded Span for Alex Meyer, a big 6-foot-9 right-hander and highly regarded pitching prospect. 
It was a reasonable move at the time, and Parker noted as much in his writeup, but he also included this excerpt from Baseball America's Aaron Fitt, which proved to be sadly prescient: "There is risk with this guy. He is 6-foot-9 and like many tall pitchers there are a lot of moving parts. There is a lot going on in that delivery. It takes a lot for those guys to put it all together."
So it does, and unfortunately, Meyer never did. All those moving parts led to constant control problems and injuries. He retired in 2019 with a 4.63 career ERA (including 14.21 with the Twins).
4. Correia Signing is a Sad Thing
By Nick Nelson
I remember this well. The signing. My reaction. Mashing out this rant on my keyboard. 
The decision to sign Kevin Correia to a two-year, $10 million contract epitomized my frustration with the Ryan regime. From the very start, it was a zero-upside move. Millions of dollars thrown at an "established innings eater" when they would've been better off giving those innings to young pitchers who couldn't have possibly been much worse. 
(On that note, the money line from this article: "It's not clear that he's a significantly better option than Liam Hendriks or Sam Deduno, particularly if you're building toward a future contender.")
Say what you will about the current front office, but they don't make moves like this, and looking back at signings like Correia (along with Mike Pelfrey, signed the same offseason) reminds me how much I appreciate it.
3. Ben Revere Traded to Philly for RHP Vance Worley & Top Pitching Prospect
By Seth Stohs
The decision to trade Span wasn't all that surprising. Revere getting traded a week later came as a much bigger shock. Still, it made sense, given the impending arrival of Aaron Hicks and the prevailing need for arms. Here, Ryan did much better than in the Span deal.
Vance Worley was a bust, but the additional "top pitching prospect" cited by Seth in the title was Trevor May, who had a nice career with the Twins and was a high-end reliever by the time he left. 
Revere had a few solid years in Philly, but was done as a big-leaguer by age 30. Turns out that's what happens when speed is basically your only standout skill.
2. 2012 Minnesota Twins Draft Picks
By Seth Stohs
Twins Daily was designed to cater to hardcore fans. We wanted to dive deeper into the areas less covered by mainstream media. So we knew things like prospect coverage and the draft were going to be some of our biggest draws. 
Thus it came as no surprise that our running list of selections in the June draft was among our most-viewed articles. In retrospect, the interest in this particular draft class makes even more sense, because it turned out to be one of the best in Twins history.
Among the picks: Byron Buxton (2nd overall), José Berríos (32nd), Tyler Duffey (160th), and Taylor Rogers (340th).
1. Happy Offseason! 2013 TwinsCentric Offseason Handbook Is Released!
By John Bonnes
The Offseason Handbook is an idea that predates Twins Daily. In fact, it basically validated the concept of Twins Daily. 
Before we launched TD, I came together with John, Parker and Seth to talk about ways we could collaborate on content, and create something bigger than our disparate blogs. We collectively produced the first Offseason Handbook, under the "TwinsCentric" banner.
The reception of that product helped convince us there was a community capable of propelling Twins Daily to success. So it feels fitting that the most popular article of the site's first year was the announcement of a new Handbook release. A decade later, both Twins Daily and the Offseason Handbook are still going strong.
MORE FROM TWINS DAILY
— Order the Offseason Handbook
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As entities that predate recorded history, it’s very hard to get something by the Injury Gods. Yet that’s exactly what happened on Tuesday afternoon, as a wicked comebacker found Joe Ryan’s pitching hand without causing lasting damage.
“Ryan’s a big part of their future plans so it seems like that’s an ideal place to really put the screws to the player and the Twins,” said a source close to Znon the Wrathful, the unspeakable beast responsible for tweaking Minnesota’s ulnar collateral ligaments. “I can’t explain it. Nor can They. The entire nether world is buzzing. To be clear, that’s mostly because of the bees we’re sending to swarm Byron Buxton next Wednesday, but it’s also the talk of the realm.”
It initially appeared that the Gods had done as they always have to the bedeviled franchise, with Ryan immediately storming off the mound and heading to the showers.
“Oh yeah, I thought for sure we tagged and bagged him,” said another source who works in Damnations and Accounts Receivable for Langurr The Plague King. “I should have known something wasn’t right when the ball didn’t deflect and hit Jorge Polanco in the eye. Classic double play and we didn’t even get the one? You don’t get surprised around this office too often, but that one put us back on our hooves.”
The resulting X-rays were negative, with Ryan diagnosed as having a mere bruise. He might not even miss a start. The lack of traumatic injury is leaving more questions than answers among Those who exist to harm and maraud.
“It’s a real stumper,” said a source familiar with Znon’s thinking. “His name is Znon the Wrathful. He just loves Himself some wrath. Lots of speculation that He’s going to make up for it by dropping a house on Ryan’s pinky toe or putting a black bear in his car. No one ever expects the black bear. Bears can’t drive!”

May 5th was a bad day. I attended the Twins game at Target Field and watched a lifeless team sink to 11-18 with a 3-1 loss against the last-place Rangers. Polanco and Max Kepler went a combined 0-for-8 with six strikeouts. I came home grumpy, and lamented that the Twins had seemingly founded their team-building strategy upon faulty cornerstones. In my frustration, I may or may not have fired out a tweet labeling Polanco and a couple other laggards "garbage."  That same night, I declared I had seen enough, and wrote off the 2021 Twins as contenders.
Sadly I was not wrong on the latter assertion, but the unkind assessment of Polanco looks downright silly in the wake of his dramatic and remarkable turnaround.
In my defense, there was plenty of validity in the expression of doubt. Polanco became a heightened subject of my scrutiny, in part because his swing looked so blatantly bad and in part because his manager seemed oddly unconcerned.
In mid-April, I wrote an article here wondering when Rocco Baldelli's faith in Polanco's bat would be shaken, noting the mounting evidence of his diminished offensive ability. At that point, Polanco owned a .358 OPS and had slashed .260/.313/.393 over his previous 164 games – good for a .303 wOBA that was nearly identical to Andrelton Simmons over the same time period. 
Given this evidence, there was just no real reason to believe in Polanco. I didn't doubt that his poor production was more a reflection of ongoing health issues than his true talent, but there were no signs of improvement on that front. Even after a second consecutive offseason ankle surgery, he was still unable to put his lower half into his left-handed swing, and thus, his numbers against right-handed pitchers remained abysmal. 
What's happened since is a good reminder that the body can sometimes take a long time to get right, and patience is generally a good policy. 
Since my aforementioned cranky tweet on May 5th, Polanco has slashed .290/.351/.533 with 20 home runs in 86 games, and lately he's turned into a walk-off machine. His Statcast metrics look radically different from the ones I shared in April. He's hitting for as much power as anyone in the league.
Polanco is not just playing at an All-Star level; he'd be right in the MVP conversation if the Twins weren't so bad.
Most importantly, Polanco has re-established himself as a high-quality building block and a key fixture in the club's contention hopes going forward. 
Hard to remember another time when I've been this delighted to be this wrong. Sorry again, Jorge. 
MORE FROM TWINS DAILY
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Remember Steve Carlton? The not-very-integral member of the 1987 World Champion Minnesota Twins was, at one time, the best pitcher in baseball. Four Cy Youngs, five years leading the National League in strikeouts (the fifth time at age 38), last pitcher to throw 300 innings a season, led the Phillies to their first title in 1980. A remarkable career.
He was also completely out of his mind.
Carlton never spoke to the media, which means we didn’t learn until he was long retired that he built a mountain lair with a 7000-foot storage cellar loaded to the gills with guns and bottled water for “The Revolution.” That revolution was coming thanks to Russian sound waves, the Skull and Bones Society, the Elders of Zion, the National Education Association, and more. I’m aware this qualifies him to represent the state of Georgia in Congress today, but in 1994 this was wild stuff.
One assumes that the Phillies knew that Steve was off his nut, but when you can produce like he did, you let that stuff slide a little bit, especially if he keeps it quiet. By the time he was failing to make the Minnesota Twins playoff roster because he wasn’t as good as Lester Straker, he was just a cooked 43-year-old with weirdly anti-Semitic ideas about how the world works. He never pitched again.
Which brings me to Andrelton Simmons.
Already the COVID patient zero of the Twins locker room, he took to social media on Thursday to let the world know, and I quote:
I’m not going to debate the efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines with Simmons or anyone else, as there is no debate to be had. They work. Please shut up and let the horses have their wormer paste. (Also, it’s “effects.”)
Across town, the Vikings are dealing with a similar situation. A handful of their best players (Adam Thielen, Harrison Smith, I guess Kirk Cousins if you squint hard enough) apparently won’t get the vacc either. It presents some hard choices for them, as they don’t have quality replacements for any of them as the regular season looms, and the NFL will make teams forfeit games if they can’t field a lineup due to COVID quarantines.
The Twins face no such dilemma.
The season is over. Simmons is an offensive liability and a good-to-excellent defender, which basically makes him a better Jeff Reboulet, if Jeff Reboulet thought Jurassic Park was real. He’s on a one-year deal. Maybe if he was the standout player in a disappointing season you could let his idiocy slide. Or maybe if it was something less harmful and kind of quirky, like thinking the earth was flat or dedicating his Instagram Stories to proving that birds are a deep-fake.
He’s not good enough to get away with this. Let the summer of Drew Maggi begin.
Image license here.

The Twins hired Derek Falvey (who hired Thad Levine) in the wake of a disastrous 103-loss season in 2016. By that point, the Twins had gone six straight years without making the playoffs, and during that span they lost more games than any team in baseball. 
The following year, Minnesota stunningly reached the postseason as a wild-card team. Then they missed out in 2018, still finishing second, before rebounding in 2019 with one of the greatest seasons in franchise history. The Twins followed in 2020 with another division title. 
To run all that back: this front office took over a team that had gone 407-565 (.419) with zero playoff appearances in its previous six years, and went 300-246 (.549) with three playoff appearances in the next four. 
Does their success owe somewhat to the foundation built before they arrived? Of course. No one would deny that Terry Ryan and Co. had cultivated an impressive nucleus before being ousted. But during those years, the Twins repeatedly failed in the draft, failed in acquisitions, and failed in player development. The results bore that out.
Let's be clear about something here: This current regime was so successful and so impressive through four years that they were repeatedly poached of talent, both in the front office and the coaching staffs they assembled. Not only that, but Falvey and Levine themselves have been courted by big-name franchises like the Red Sox and Phillies. 
What did they say, according to publicized reports on the matter? 
"No thanks, we're going to see through what we're building here."
And so, to see flocks of fans calling for their heads because of one bad season, which is no worse than the ones we saw repeatedly before they arrived ... it's a little hard to take. 
Falvey became the youngest head exec in the league when he took Minnesota's top job. Currently he is 38 years old, which is three years younger than the DH he traded to Tampa Bay last month. Up until now he never experienced serious adversity during his tenure, which speaks to how smoothly things have gone in the first four years. 
The same could be said, by the way, for his managerial choice Rocco Baldelli, who was named Manager of the Year in 2019 (as the youngest skipper in baseball, with no experience in the role) and then won a second straight division title in his second season.
These people have shown their mettle. They've won. A lot. I realize they haven't won in the playoffs, and that sucks, but they haven't had nearly the opportunity of their predecessors. 
Are we not going to give them a chance to learn from failure?
Obviously the free agent pitching additions from the past winter have failed at every level. But this front office has made plenty of good and savvy pickups in the past, which helped fuel the success of high-quality staffs the last two years. And in any case, Falvey wasn't really hired to sign pitchers. He was hired to develop them.
On that front, the jury is still out. This operation was four years in when a pandemic came along and wiped out an entire minor-league season. The fact that Minnesota's upper minors are currently loaded with intriguing high-upside arms would suggest the mission was on track, and is just now getting back on the rails. 
Soon we'll start seeing those arms (along with the ones acquired at the deadline this year) ushered into majors, and at that point we'll be able to make real assessments. But until then, you're judging an incomplete project. 
This reassembled baseball ops department has been working ahead of schedule basically since they took over a moribund franchise in despair. They hit a setback this year, and it's been painful. Let's give them a chance to get back on track in the wake of a major disruptive event and humbling follow-up season.
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The Los Angeles Angels make their yearly visit to Target Field this weekend, meaning Twins fans will get to see the brilliant Shohei Ohtani. In the other clubhouse, Willians Astudillo returns from St. Paul to take Alex Kirilloff’s place on the roster.
And that has some physicians worried.
“Quite simply, if you’re in poor health or have underlying conditions, watching these games might be harmful,” said Dr. David Gorman, a heart specialist at Fairview Southdale. “The human body wasn’t meant to experience this much spectacle.”
Ohtani, the American League’s starting pitcher in the All-Star Game, also leads the majors with 34 home runs, many of which involve him sending baseballs to hell, where they belong. Astudillo, while not nearly as accomplished a player as Ohtani, plays every game like a bowling ball filled with kerosene, set on fire, and rolled into a Williams-Sonoma. The combination of that much skill and abandon may be too much for some people.
“What if Ohtani hits one that lands at, like, the Pizza Luce on 4th Street,” said Gorman. “Then the next inning Astudillo tries to stretch a single to a double? So many people skipped their regular check-ups in the last year or so that we have to be concerned about how the body will react.”
Gorman said the true concern comes on Sunday.
“The Angels haven’t announced their starting pitcher yet,” said Gorman. “What if they pencil in Ohtani, and the Twins send Astudillo to the plate? What if Astudillo hits a comebacker and they’re racing to the bag? Is that too much joy? You have to ask yourself if the risk is worth it. The teams could do it, but no one is asking if they should do it.”

When NASA astronomer Steve Bland observed a new asteroid hurtling through space earlier this month, he was alarmed. The object was clearly on a path that would send it directly towards Earth. “Obviously, that’s a nightmare scenario,” said Bland. “Even a relatively small object could wreak havoc on the impact area.”
Further study relieved Bland and his co-workers when it was determined that the asteroid, named 2021 SB, would disintegrate rapidly upon entering the planet’s atmosphere. However, there was one note of concern.
“Just from following the course it’s travelling through our solar system, there is zero doubt in my mind that it’s definitely going to land on top of Minnesota Twins center fielder Byron Buxton,” said Bland.
It’s estimated that 2021 SB will be the size of a golf ball once it reaches Buxton and will likely end its grand celestial journey on his throwing shoulder or right big toe.
“I can’t say I’ve ever seen anything like this before,” admitted Bland. "Most asteroids do not target individuals."
The Twins say they’ve been notified by NASA of the situation.
“It’s not an existential threat to all human life but Byron is for sure going to be out indefinitely,” said Twins manager Rocco Baldelli. “We spoke with Byron and he’s as disappointed as we are.”
Officials say the asteroid will likely reach Buxton immediately after his left hand is fully healed from the fracture suffered during Monday’s game versus Cincinnati.
“2021 SB actually appeared to slow down on Monday evening,” said Bland. “It was on pace to get here on Wednesday but now looks like it’s taking its sweet time. Yes, that’s unusual.”
Although Bland didn’t want to speculate on the actual date, time, and location, sources close to the team say they expect the space object to injure Buxton on his first day back with the Twins or on a St. Paul rehab assignment when he’s signing autographs for impressionable young children.