Mental mistake costs crucial run

[SethNotStohs]

The Nats won 3-2 last night, helped by two runs in the 8th, the second of which was easily avoidable. 
 

With Griffin Jax on the mound, two outs, and CJ Abrams on second, Lane Thomas snuck one through the left side of the infield for a single. Trevor Larnach threw home and missed badly, allowing Thomas to go to second, tying the score at 2-2. 
 

The proper throw was to second to keep Lane Thomas on first base. 
 

But don’t take my word for it—just ask Carlos Correa. As Larnach got the ball, Correa was clearly telling him where to throw it—second base. 

In the next at bat, Keibert Ruiz hit a single to shallow left. Had Thomas been on first, he would have ended that play on third base at best—and maybe even held to second. Instead, Thomas got the jump from second and came around to easily score the go-ahead run. Keeping Thomas on first would have given Jax an opportunity to get out of the inning allowing only one run and the Twins a chance to win a tie game at home later.

The season is long and it’s been a great start, but I hope these little things don’t pile up.  

*Note—I was watching the game on mute. If this came up in the broadcast or was already discussed let me know and I’ll delete. 

[CRF]

For some reason, that's a mistake that many, many players make...and it's such a fundamentally easy one to avoid. The pic is perfect. It clearly shows that CC was telling him to throw it in to 2nd. It's so true...these little things can really hurt a team over the course of a season. 

[stringer bell]

Yep, terrible play. Here's the way I see it: Larnach charges and prepares to fire home, at the last minute he sees he has no play and tries to get the ball to the infield, but the ball slips and he threw a pop fly over the pitcher's mound. It wasn't charged as an error, but surely was and allowed the winning run to be in scoring position.

My point is I do believe Larnach was aware of what he should have done, but too late and the hand grenade he threw to the infield did absolutely no good.

[Linus]

This is no surprise. The Twins play sloppy baseball most of the time. They started the year with some clean games and I was hopeful. Now they are back to the same crap as last year in the field anyway. I don’t if this is a reflection on Rocco or if the Twins just have a bunch of fundamentally flawed players but this is no blip on the radar. This is who they are as a team. 

[John Belinski]

There is NO excuse for a play like this, but Rocco seems to say we just have to play better. Someday Rocco will go away and the Twins can hire a real manager and not a trainee manager who appears to be a slow learner plus has NO clue on how to handle pitchers. Have Lopez, who has allowed 0 runs in 2023, pitch the 8th inning and the closer pitch the 9th inning for a Twins win.  The Twins are not a great team, but with Rocco as their manager they will have a hard time making playoffs even in a weak division.

[roger]

Thanks for posting this, Seth.

Seeing the rally began with a slow grounder that died, what 20 feet into left field, for a double it was a tough loss.  My interpretation of what happened is that Larnach was trying to gun the guy out at home and whether due to a cold hand or whatever, the ball slipped.  Have not heard if he has commented on the play.

Regardless, this was a game the Twins could have, maybe should have won.   Am beginning to wonder what is going on with Miranda.  He doesn't look like the young man we saw in the minors two years ago and much of last year with the Twins.  They really need to get Farmer back so he can play some third base and give the young man a few games to reset.

Don't blame Jax one bit as none of the balls where hit hard at all.  I'll be honest, I don't understand how the left side of the infield can be that open when they no longer allow a shift?

Will be interesting come late September.  This is a game that no one will remember, yet, may be huge in deciding the team's fate in the final standings.

[Nine of twelve]

29 minutes ago, John Belinski said:

Have Lopez, who has allowed 0 runs in 2023, pitch the 8th inning and the closer pitch the 9th inning for a Twins win.

The Twins do not have a designated closer. Rather, the manager selects the pitcher to match up with the opponent's batting order. This is the system most teams are moving toward, and it makes sense to try to use your best reliever(s) against the opponent's best hitters, no matter what the inning. The Nationals had the bottom of their order coming up in the 8th inning, so he went with Jax, saving either Lopez or Duran (presumably last night it was Lopez) for the 9th inning when the top of the order was coming around. And by the way, Jax has pitched well. In last night's outing he was victimized by two seeing-eye grounders, a defensive misplay, and a soft single.

[Azviking101]

I think we’re nearing time to move on from Larnach. The worry with him since college was always his inability to hit offspeed. He’s now at .160 career BA against offspeed and getting a league low 40% fastballs because of it. He’s not just going to get it. His whiff rate is horrendous. 
Move Gallo back to the outfield, bring Julien back up for first base/DH, play buxton part time at CF and this offense improves drastically. 

[Nine of twelve]

16 minutes ago, roger said:

I'll be honest, I don't understand how the left side of the infield can be that open when they no longer allow a shift?

Teams can and should and do still shift. It's just that the shift has limitations in the rules that weren't there before. The third baseman and shortstop are allowed to be anywhere on the infield dirt to the left of second base. In this case the batter was left handed and the scouting report obviously showed him to be a pull hitter so Correa was nearly behind second base and Miranda was also well toward second. This is the proper positioning, and I'm sure teams will continue to play that way against this batter unless and until he shows more of a tendency to go the other way.

[Nine of twelve]

5 minutes ago, Azviking101 said:

I think we’re nearing time to move on from Larnach. The worry with him since college was always his inability to hit offspeed. He’s now at .160 career BA against offspeed and getting a league low 40% fastballs because of it. He’s not just going to get it. His whiff rate is horrendous. 
Move Gallo back to the outfield, bring Julien back up for first base/DH, play buxton part time at CF and this offense improves drastically. 

Disagree. Completely. He's 26 years old, improving, healthy for the first time since he first came up to the majors, still 2-3 years away from his prime. It would be a huge mistake to cut him loose. Trade him only if a team wants to overpay for him.

[jorgenswest]

Larnach has had very little AAA time and has done very poorly (195/311/310) at that level.

Was he rushed? Would he have seen a lot more off speed offerings had he played AAA until he found success? Would he be more fundamentally sound? The majors isn’t the place to teach fundamentals. It is about coming up fundamentally sound and adjusting to the speed of the game.