Game Score: Tigers 7, Twins 0

[Matthew Lenz]

The Twins couldn’t make another late inning comeback and fell to the Tigers 7-0 in Sunday matinee. They fall to 39-53 on the season after getting swept in Detroit. That and more in today’s recap.

Box Score

J.A. Happ: 7.0 IP, 11 H, 7 ER, 1 BB, 4 K (65% strikes)

Homeruns: none

Bottom 3 WPA: Happ (-.195), Cruz (-.134), Larnach (-.111)

Win Probability Chart (via Fangraphs)

Happ Eats Innings...And That’s About It.

I don’t mean to sound ungrateful about Happ giving the Twins seven innings in a single game surrounded by double headers, but it’s hard to be appreciative when his heat map looked like this through five innings.

The red zone in the middle only got bigger throughout his last two innings, which is how you end up with 1 walk and 65% strikes (good) but allowing 11 hits and seven earned runs (baaad). He was efficient to a fault on Sunday and even generated a 15.4-percent swinging strike rate, but ultimately threw too many hittable pitches as the Tigers had an xBA of .299 against Happ.

On the year, Happ’s ERA now sits at 6.15 and, using FanGraphs Game Score metric, has pitched as many below average games as above average. Furthermore, his “above average” games are barely that, whereas a few of his below average games have been really, really bad. At this point, it’s hard to see Happ having any value to anyone and it will be interesting to see how long he’s on the roster, if he makes it to the trade deadline.

Offense Lifeless Against Detroit..Again

The Twins were only able to muster up six hits against the Tigers, and three of those hits were quickly erased with double plays from Nelson Cruz, Max Kepler, and Trevor Larnach. It's worth noting that the Twins may have had a bit of bad luck today as they're xBA was .308 and their actual team batting average was a measly .206. As if scoring zero runs wasn't enough to show the lack of highlights for the day, I usually like to embed tweets from the Twins or Bally's Sports North for replays but even they didn't have anything to tweet during the game. Ouch.

It was encouraging to see Larnach get two hits today as he was in a considerable slump in the week leading up to the All-Star break and had gone a combined 0-for-6 during the Saturday doubleheader. The other lone bright spot on the day was Luis Arraez who had a couple great at-bats and ended the day with two hits of his own, including the Twins only extra-base hit of the day.

Getting shutout by a team that is eight games below .500 isn't good and the Twins did it twice in two days. Along with the offense, the only thing that is going to make this team enjoyable to watch is the emergence of the young talent over the next couple months. We may not have a lot of highlights but hopefully we'll have a lot of hopeful signs for 2022 and beyond.

Bullpen Usage

Juan Minaya, who was just recalled from St. Paul, came on to pitch the eighth inning where he faced the minimum and struck out a batter. He's only thrown 7.1 innings in 2021 but with the state of the Twins season and bullpen, I'd hope to see him stick with the club and improve on his 3.68 ERA.

	WED	THU	FRI	SAT	SUN	TOT
Burrows	0	0	0	32	0	32
Rogers	0	0	0	21	0	21
Robles	0	0	0	18	0	18
Minaya	0	0	0	0	13	13
Thielbar	0	0	0	0	0	0
Duffey	0	0	0	0	0	0
Colomé	0	0	0	0	0	0
Alcala	0	0	0	0	0	0

 

The Twins travel to Chicago for another double header against the White Sox on Monday followed by night caps on Tuesday and Wednesday before coming back home on Thursday.

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[wsnydes]

So much for carrying the positive momentum through the break...

Man, what a plummet back to reality.

[jkcarew]

This club…and the manager…make the 2016 club, and it’s manager, look positively gritty and over-achieving.

[Brock Beauchamp]

It looked like Happ might be moved for salary relief only but after this, hard to seen even that happening. 

[Vanimal46]

Grab the defibrillator. This team doesn’t have a pulse. I see no reason to continue letting Happ start for the team… There’s someone in AAA who can at least match Happ’s 7+ ERA over the last 3 months. Stick a fork in him. 

[cHawk]

Happ can go join Shoemaker, bring up someone from AAA.

[Platoon]

10 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

It looked like Happ might be moved for salary relief only but after this, hard to seen even that happening. 

Maybe a better move would be to the witness protection program. He could disguise himself as a MLB pitcher. Not a soul would recognize him. 

[tony&rodney]

MLB is a tough business. If the Twins score 8 runs, Happ is a tenacious winner, but the Bomba Squad is missing and Happ just keeps finding the barrel.   Right now, the Twins are messy. Now, it is on to Chicago. At least Rodon will not be a factor as he pitched today.

[ashbury]

I was hoping for either wins or clarity as we approach the trade deadline.  Guess I'm getting the latter. No false hopes being raised!

[wsnydes]

26 minutes ago, cHawk said:

Happ can go join Shoemaker, bring up someone from AAA.

I'd rather he not.  I'd prefer him to decline the assignment and become a free agent.

I don't know from whom, but Shoemaker is just stealing innings from someone that might actually help the big league club in the future.  Happ joining him only makes it worse.

[wsnydes]

13 minutes ago, ashbury said:

I was hoping for either wins or clarity as we approach the trade deadline.  Guess I'm getting the latter. No false hopes being raised!

Likewise.  Clarity is good, but wins are certainly more fun.

[RpR]

39 minutes ago, Platoon said:

Maybe a better move would be to the witness protection program. He could disguise himself as a MLB pitcher. Not a soul would recognize him. 

Had he given up 1 run, he would have lost, blaming him makes no sense.

[RpR]

17 minutes ago, wsnydes said:

I'd rather he not.  I'd prefer him to decline the assignment and become a free agent.

I don't know from whom, but Shoemaker is just stealing innings from someone that might actually help the big league club in the future.  Happ joining him only makes it worse.

Stealing nothing; if they are good enough to make the big league, they will.  If they do not make it it is their lack of talent and nothing more.

[wsnydes]

5 minutes ago, RpR said:

Stealing nothing; if they are good enough to make the big league, they will.  If they do not make it it is their lack of talent and nothing more.

Maybe, but I still don't want to be carrying a 34 year old, washed up player at AAA that is only there because he made it abundantly clear that he couldn't help the big league club now, let alone an additional 38 year old.  And neither will help the club in the future.

[ashbury]

37 minutes ago, RpR said:

Had he given up 1 run, he would have lost, blaming him makes no sense.

Had the Twins offense scored 6 runs they would have lost.  There can be plenty of blame to go around.

[Platoon]

48 minutes ago, RpR said:

Had he given up 1 run, he would have lost, blaming him makes no sense.

Brock wanted to move him somewhere for salary relief. I offered the option of the witness protection program, in neither of these instances would have the amount of runs he gave up today made any difference. ?? But I do agree, if he had given up one run we still woulda lost. 

[LewFordLives]

I wish I could say getting swept by the Tigers has been the low point of this season, but there has been too much competition for that dubious honor.

[bean5302]

After this last start, I can't see any MLB team discussing Happ at all. There are guys any team has at AAA who would probably be a better choice.

[darwin22]

7 hours ago, Vanimal46 said:

Grab the defibrillator. This team doesn’t have a pulse. I see no reason to continue letting Happ start for the team… There’s someone in AAA who can at least match Happ’s 7+ ERA over the last 3 months. Stick a fork in him. 

I agree!  Saying that be careful what you wish for as I would NOT be surprised to see Happ replaced by...GULP....Matt Shoemaker, who just had a 5 inning shutout the other night.  IMO, what should happen--assuming Pineda is dealt before the deadline----is Charlie Barnes getting called back up for a rotation slot.  Barnes pitched well yesterday---1 ER in 4.1 IP.  Im sure Happ is just happy tonight that he didn't have to face the White Sox.  No reason he should continue to get starts in this train wreck of a season.  Time to get Barnes back up and soon after Josh Winder.

[insagt1]

6 hours ago, RpR said:

Had he given up 1 run, he would have lost, blaming him makes no sense.

 not necessarily.  Strategy is a lot different when you are losing 1-0. .When you are down by 7 late, you know yourchances of winning are very slim and you have to play for a big inning.