Twins 9, Blue Jays 4: Offense Wakes Up Late, Twins Take Series in Toronto

[shabbos1]

A win is a win, but a question for the statisticians: how often does a team who racks up 17 Ks actually end up winning the game?

[Squirrel]

1 hour ago, stringer bell said:

Credit to the home run hitters, but also credit to the table setters. Taylor started the big inning with a bunt hit and Julien and Solano both reached to set up the huge inning. 

It takes a village! 🙂

[rv78]

Nothing like a win to make the fans happy. Unfortunately the approach offensively is the same. Swing for the fences and if you get lucky we'll score, otherwise it's a strike out. Oh well, that's what they want and it works occasionally, just not often enough to matter.

[dogsday]

Most games a team will make 27 outs. That those outs are strike outs only matters when you need a productive out (advancing a runner, scoring a runner on a sac fly) and when the strikeouts are correlated with not hitting at all.  (Which they often are.)

Sure strikeouts are tough to watch (but any tougher than a pop-up or a weak ground out?) But if strikeouts are accompanied by 12 hits and 9 runs, you should take that every game. The Twins will win a lot of games scoring 9 runs.

[rwilfong86]

I hope we can look back at June 10th as the day the Twins turned their 2023 season around and run away with the AL Central by double digit games. We can hope right?

[Doctor Wu]

8 hours ago, stringer bell said:

Credit to the home run hitters, but also credit to the table setters. Taylor started the big inning with a bunt hit and Julien and Solano both reached to set up the huge inning. 

Taylor's BA and OBP may still be low by most standards, but he's done a lot of little things --- as well as hitting a few  timely homers --- that has helped the club win games this year. I continue to be impressed by his play, and also hearing his thoughtful post-game comments. Glad to have him on the team. 

[NotAboutWinning]

1 hour ago, dogsday said:

Most games a team will make 27 outs. That those outs are strike outs only matters when you need a productive out (advancing a runner, scoring a runner on a sac fly) and when the strikeouts are correlated with not hitting at all.  (Which they often are.)

Sure strikeouts are tough to watch (but any tougher than a pop-up or a weak ground out?) But if strikeouts are accompanied by 12 hits and 9 runs, you should take that every game. The Twins will win a lot of games scoring 9 runs.

Strikeouts have the disadvantage of not putting any stress on the defense. This especially relevant against weaker teams. Miscommunication on a pop fly or a weird bounce on a weak grounder can result in getting on base. I would be more ok with the strike outs if our batters could make the adjustment to simply advance runners when needed. I think that would improve our bases loaded production immensely!

[bighat]

8 hours ago, Rosterman said:

The 17 strikeouts is truly alarming. But...home runs do work!

It really is - and it's worth noting once again that this non-contact type of baseball is extremely difficult to watch. Yes the home runs are great but if this only happens once for every 10 ballgames, it's going to be hard to keep any fans interested. 

Great win. Let's go for the sweep, put in the A team today Rocco! 

[John Belinski]

What a odd game where the winning team strikes out 17 times of the 27 outs, but still wins. The Twins hitters missed 17 time, but didn't miss 3 times.

[tarheeltwinsfan]

2 hours ago, Doctor Wu said:

Taylor's BA and OBP may still be low by most standards, but he's done a lot of little things --- as well as hitting a few  timely homers --- that has helped the club win games this year. I continue to be impressed by his play, and also hearing his thoughtful post-game comments. Glad to have him on the team. 

Agree 100%.

[Blyleven2011]

15 hours ago, wabene said:

Man I hope the worm has turned on these bats

And doesn't crawl back in its hole  ...

We'll see how the game goes today ,,, it was a real motivator  for the fans , will it be a motivator for the players  ...

[D.C Twins]

Great win but the challenges remain. 

Essentially we were able to hit against one bad reliever with an ERA north of 5 (or 6 maybe... I can't remember)

I hope things are changing, but we may have only shown that we can hit one bad reliever.

We will find out!