Braves 8, Twins 6: Twins Rally to Tie It Late, But Jhoan Duran Hit Hard in 10-Inning Gut Punch

[Hans Birkeland]

Even with a 90% or so chance of making the playoffs, the Twins have seemed to teeter on the brink of collapse, with the weight of their injuries testing their depth to its breaking point. They fought hard to get back to level in this game, but ultimately, the Braves lineup was too much for Jhoan Duran. Atlanta pulled away in the 10th.

Image courtesy of © Brad Rempel-USA TODAY Sports

Box Score:
Starting Pitcher: Simeon Woods Richardson: 4 2/3 IP, 3 H, 4 ER, 3 BB, 3 K (91 Pitches, 55 Strikes, 60.4%)
Home Runs: None
Bottom 3 WPA: Jhoan Duran (-.472), Royce Lewis (-.223), Austin Martin (-.202)
Win Probability Chart (Via Fangraphs):

Things have been rickety in Twinsland lately. The past three games I have personally recapped have been the Jorge Alcala implosion in Texas, the swan song of Steven Okert's Twins career in San Diego, and the Eddy Julien 9th inning error leading to a loss at home to St. Louis. Last night, Bailey Ober went from being very likely to receive Cy Young votes to a guy with an ERA over 4.00. Nine earned runs will do that.

Now the Twins were tasked with facing a hot (and battle-tested) Braves team needing to win two in a row to take the series. Chris Sale looms in Wednesday's finale, so that would seem unlikely. But don't overlook Tuesday's starter, rookie Spencer Schwellenbach, who has been hot since the All-Star break and features premium raw stuff, hitting 98 MPH with his four seam fastball, and 95 MPH with his cutter (which is absurd compared to anyone except Emmanuel Clase).

Simeon Woods Richardson took the ball for the Twins, coming off a start against the Padres in which he showed a lot of moxie. Staked to a huge lead, SWR started pumping fastballs and nothing else to the Padres hitters, and taking about three seconds between pitches. He was dancing and strutting off the mound, but even the old heads couldn't say he was disrespecting the game- he threw strikes and came right at every hitter- and he gave the Twins exactly what they needed after dropping the first two of that series.

SWR looked good again tonight, at least stuff-wise. He located all three of his primary pitches and looked in control of what he was doing. After a quick first inning, he allowed the red-hot Matt Olson to lace an opposite field double on a decent enough slider. He fell behind Michael Harris II but rebounded to force a full count after six straight fastballs. He then threw a dotted slider, down and in on the black, and Harris dropped the bat head on it and lined it 424 feet.

I bring up the Will Harris cutter to Howie Kendrick in the 2019 World Series a lot, because it is instructive that a pitcher can throw the absolute best pitch he can possibly throw, and if a hitter guesses right, it just won't matter. In tonight's game, it meant a 2-0 deficit.

The Twins worked Schwellenbach hard, resulting in him throwing nearly 30 pitches in the first (he still struck out the side). They put runners on second and third in the second via a Carlos Santana single and Ryan Jeffers double, but Austin Martin struck out on a borderline pitch to end the threat. Matt Wallner doubled off the wall in the third, but Julien tapped out to end the frame.

In the fourth, Max Kepler reached on a swinging bunt, and Santana doubled to the right field corner. Kepler is a notoriously unaggressive baserunner, but he also has been nursing a knee injury- either way he didn't score, although he was animated in discussing with third base coach Tommy Watkins afterward. Jeffers then hit a liner that deflected off of Schwellenbach's glove, high in the air and landed... right in Whit Merrifield's glove. Martin then struck out to make the inning a total waste. The baseball gods just hate me in particular, I guess.

SWR's mettle was tested in the fifth. After Ramon Laureano singled, the lovely Gio Urshela flew out to right. Orlando Arcia had two painted pitches called for balls, and ended up drawing a walk, prompting SWR to start chirping a bit at the home plate umpire. He locked in on the next batter, Merrifield, who had five hits the night before. That was to SWR's detriment, as Laureano and Arcia executed a double steal. Merrifield did end up striking out, but Jorge Soler laid off some tough pitches and drew a walk, ending the night for the Twins rookie.

Jorge Alcala has excelled in the fireman role this year (not as much when given a clean inning), but Marcell Ozuna jumped on the first pitch he saw and roped a single to left, doubling the lead. It's okay to hate Marcell Ozuna.

The Twins got Schwellenbach up to 106 pitches, with two-out walks to Wallner and Julien ending his night. The slumping Royce Lewis jumped on the first pitch he saw from Dylan Lee, but was a hair out front and lined it foul. He ended up striking out on three pitches to end yet another threat.

Caleb Boushley made his return to the big leagues in the sixth and although Harris hit a ball so hard (114 MPH) off the right field wall he couldn't even reach second, Boushley gutted his way through two innings, allowing three hits.

41-year-old Jesse Chavez was called up on to pitch the sixth and seventh innings. After a Willi Castro bloop single, Trevor Larnach lined a double that skipped past the mercurial Jared Kelenic's glove and scored Castro. The ever predictable Wallner got a (cookie) cutter on 3-1 and smacked it 105 MPH off the right field wall to score Larnach. That prompted the Braves to take the game seriously and brought in former Tigers punching bag Joe Jimenez to stop the bleeding.

He wasn't successful, at least not at first. Julien worked the count to 2-2 before getting a slider from Jimenez to his liking and yanked it down the line past a diving Olson, scoring Wallner. The scuffling Lewis popped out, while Kepler and Santana followed by whiffing on sliders they knew were coming.

The first two batters for the Twins the next inning were retired quickly, but Willi Castro squared a ball up and doubled to right-center, bringing up Trevor Larnach to face a new pitcher, the Braves elite closer, Raisel Iglesias. Iglesias is a change-up artist, which would seem to be a bad matchup for Larnach, and perhaps got Rocco Baldelli considering pinch hitting Jose Miranda. He stuck with Larnach, and he delivered, blooping a change-up off the plate outside that landed in front of a diving Kelenic to tie the game.

After going quietly in the ninth, Ozuna greeted Jhoan Duran with a double to right-center that Kelenic misread (does this guy have any baseball instincts?) and only advanced to third on. Olson broke his bat and grounded to second, which Julien threw home on, not even coming close to nabbing Kelenic at the plate. It wouldn't matter, as Travis D'Arnaud rifled a ball up the middle to score pinch-runner Luke Williams from second, and Laureano doubled to score two more.

The Twins at least brought the tying run to the plate in their half of the 10th, with Miranda and Castro collecting hits to give Larnach a chance. He delivered an RBI hit for the third at-bat in a row, this time against Pierce Johnson. That brought Wallner to the plate as the potential winning run, but he swung through two hittable pitches before striking out on a nasty curveball.

Trends:

	Healthy	Hurt
Performing Great
Fine
Poor
IL/Minors
C	Ryan Jeffers 📈	Christian Vazquez 📈
1B	Carlos Santana 📈	Alex Kirilloff 📉	Jose Miranda 📉
2B	Edouard Julien 📈	Kyle Farmer 📈'
3B	Royce Lewis 📉
SS	Carlos Correa 📈	Brooks Lee 📈
LF	Matt Wallner 📈	Trevor Larnach 📈	Austin Martin 📈
CF	Byron Buxton 📉	Manuel Margot 📉
RF	Max Kepler 📉
UTIL	Willi Castro 📉
SP	Pablo Lopez 📈	Bailey Ober 📈	Joe Ryan 📉	Chris Paddack 📉	Louie Varland 📈
RSP	David Festa 📈	Zebby Matthews 📈	Simeon Woods Richardson 📈
CR	Jhoan Duran 📉	Griffin Jax 📈
SR	Brock Stewart 📉	Jorge Alcala 📉	Cole Sands 📈
MR	Caleb Thielbar 📈	Scott Blewett 📈
LR	Josh Winder 📈	Ronny Henriquez 📈	Randy Dobnak 📉	Caleb Boushley 📈

Stray Notes:
-Kepler is out of sorts. He is usually pretty good at not chasing, but he chased outside the zone several times today trying to cheat on fastballs.
-After a six pitch shut down eighth inning, Cole Sands has a WHIP of 0.97. Imagine the Twins bullpen without him this year, sheesh.
-Larnach has been a curiosity in that he has hit well enough to keep his spot, but never seemed to get truly hot. To his credit, he never really slumped, either. He entered play with an .871 OPS in August, which plays pretty well.
-Santana made two incredible defensive plays. The first is below:

The second was even more impactful. With Griffin Jax on to hold the score at 4-4 in the ninth, Merrifield hit a one out looper that looked ticketed for right field, the exact kind of lucky, rally-starting hit that has bitten Jax in the past. Instead, Santana got a great break on the ball and made a somersaulting catch for the second out. Extension candidate?

What’s Next: David Festa (2-3, 5.20 ERA) goes against NL Cy Young front-runner Chris Sale (14-3, 2.62 ERA and I advocated for acquiring him prior to 2023 but who's counting). The Twins will need to reach into their bag of tricks from the mid 2010's, when they were somehow able to solve Sale on a consistent basis.

Postgame Interviews:
(Coming Soon)
Bullpen Usage Chart:

	FRI	SAT	SUN	MON	TUES	TOT
Durán	0	16	25	0	19	60
Jax	0	19	12	0	10	41
Blewett	0	0	0	39	0	39
Alcalá	25	0	0	0	8	33
Henríquez	0	0	0	32	0	32
Sands	0	0	26	0	6	32
Boushley	0	0	0	0	32	32
Thielbar	18	0	0	0	8	26

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[USAFChief]

Finding ways to lose.

Uffda.

[Peter]

Blame this loss on Watkins!!! Kepler would’ve scored-twins need to be done with this series and move forward get on a long winning streak starting with blue jays/tampa bay and put KC in their place! Yes we are in mini slump but Lee/cores and Buxton will be back and twins will win division!!! 

[mikelink45]

What is our record versus good teams now?  Buxton and Correa and Lee out - Lewis ice cold.  Wallner is doing his share, Larnach too, but we need more than that.  Now we have had Alcala, Ober, Duran blow up - we cannot afford this to continue. 

[tony&rodney]

FWIW, Lee looked really rough tonight in Omaha.

[ashbury]

How many gut punches does this team plan to take, anyway?

[AKTwinsFan]

I guess if Martin caught the ball (Buxton would have), and Julien made a clean throw home (second bad throw in as many days), then things may have gone differently. Late inning failures keep killing the team, and possibly the season.

[knothole61]

Crazy season...the Twins have been pretty awful for the past 10 days or so, while losing games in the most gut wrench of fashions. And yet...and yet, they find themselves just two losses behind the co-leaders of the A.L. Central!

It's kind of a miracle really. 

I admit that this may be pollyannaish to some degree, but I like the position that we are in. Even with a win tomorrow and a three game set with Pittsburgh coming up, I don't think that Cleveland can stop their slide--after all they will soon have to play six in a row on the road against KC and the Dodgers. In addition, the recent home stand debacle against the Royals, and their losing ways in general of late, must have fostered some serious doubts within the Guardians' organization and fan base. I think that KC will be the target for the Twins going forward (they look very solid right now) and not only do the Twins seem to have their number on the diamond this year, but they have only to end up tied with KC after 162 to take the Division.  

Win a tough one against Sale tomorrow and then take the next two series against Toronto and Tampa Bay and we'll roll into KC on September 6 in a strong position and with our destiny in our own hands. Despite the disappointments of the last several days, we have nothing to lose but our chains and a world to win-or something like that! 

 

   

[S Bart]

I still am perplexed why Baldelli seems to limit Jax to one inning of relief. He threw only ten pitches and performed well in a close game. Duran has been rocky this year and once again fell apart. 

 

[Fezig]

I gotta believe Duran is tipping is pitches somehow. 

[Doctor Gast]

When the SPs have been there, the hitting hasn't. Now the hitting is coming around, the SPs are failing. We need to maintain our pitching strong.

[Karbo]

They need some guys back. Buxton, Correa, Ryan, Lee. With 3 rookie pitchers it's almost a miracle they have the record they have. Time is running out.

[mikelink45]

1 minute ago, Karbo said:

They need some guys back. Buxton, Correa, Ryan, Lee. With 3 rookie pitchers it's almost a miracle they have the record they have. Time is running out.

Ryan is not coming back.  The other three keep teasing us, but at the end of August how much faith do we have in them returning and even more - performing?

[CRF]

Wow! This thing is turning into a major dumpster fire real fast. The last two weeks are like Toonces driving the car off the cliff. At this rate, we'll fall out of the wild card race before you know it. 

[chinmusic]

Is Lewis just slumping, or is he playing hurt??

[Whitey333]

Twins are now 38-49 against teams with winning records.  They have lost 7 of last 9 and are fortunate that Cle eland is also stinking it up or we would be out of the race.  No we can't e pect Duran to be perfect all the time.  However he hasn't been perfect very often.  He's not the same shut down closer he used to be at times.  He has 8 losses this year.  That's way too many for someone that you count on to close out games and seal the victories.  

[thelanges5]

Lewis doing the slump thing, Kepler needs to be on the IL if he is hurt. Alcalá and Duran not pitching well. Hopefully this is just a really bad week and we can get back on track. 

[Whitey333]

LEWIS?  Remember he told us he doesn't slump.  He's been terrible for quite à while now.

[thelanges5]

[DJL44]

7 hours ago, S Bart said:

I still am perplexed why Baldelli seems to limit Jax to one inning of relief. He threw only ten pitches and performed well in a close game. Duran has been rocky this year and once again fell apart. 

I can't fault Baldelli for using Jax for one inning, a role which he has excelled in. I also can't fault Baldelli for using Jhoan Duran in relief in a close game, he doesn't have any better options.

[hitterscount]

Atlanta is missing several starters including an MVP caliber player and yet we are about to get swept at home. Looking like if they make the playoffs it will be an early exit, they don’t compete against quality teams. Unfortunately they are doing enough for another year of Rocco ball, how depressing.

[TwinsDr2021]

33 minutes ago, hitterscount said:

Atlanta is missing several starters including an MVP caliber player and yet we are about to get swept at home. Looking like if they make the playoffs it will be an early exit, they don’t compete against quality teams. Unfortunately they are doing enough for another year of Rocco ball, how depressing.

Anything can happen in the playoffs against anybody, just get there and quit worrying about what will happen in the playoffs, until the playoffs happen.

[mnfireman]

1 hour ago, Whitey333 said:

Twins are now 38-49 against teams with winning records.  They have lost 7 of last 9 and are fortunate that Cle eland is also stinking it up or we would be out of the race. 

Fortunately Boston is also struggling, falling 4 games out of the last WC spot.

[DJL44]

Reminder to everyone that the Rangers ended last season with a second half record of 38-33.

[LambchoP]

We sure are playing like a team that doesn't belong in any playoff discussions. With all our starters only going 4 or 5 innings our bullpen is going to have to pitch half the game. We don't have anywhere near the depth for that which means we're going to give up a lot of runs, meaning we'll probably have to out slug the other team to win. That doesn't seem likely with Lewis and Miranda slumping bad. I think Lee getting called up and replacing Julien at 2nd will help. I'm seriously starting to doubt if we'll see Correa or Buxton again this year. It's really a bad look that our "stars" can't seem to find the will to play during a tough playoff chase, but if we do make it, I'll guarantee you they'll be miraculously healed all of s sudden and ready to go in front of a national audience:( PS, call up Keirsey and dump Margot. Dump Farmer too, any replacement level AAA player will outperform him. Severino, Eeles, Castillo. Farmer has no business on a major league roster.

[David Maro]

Why did Duran throw a hanging curveball to Ozuna?He threw a 101 fastball right by him and Ozuna looked like the guy in Major League 2.Everyone thinks Buxton would have caught the ball Martin missed,but he probably would have missed the rest of the season.

Where did the offense go,they had ducks on the pond almost every inning and the pitcher on the ropes.He was over 100 pitches before the end of the 5th inning.If they don't figure it out soon they will be playing golf in October.

[jccracraft]

11 hours ago, Peter said:

Blame this loss on Watkins!!! Kepler would’ve scored-twins need to be done with this series and move forward get on a long winning streak starting with blue jays/tampa bay and put KC in their place! Yes we are in mini slump but Lee/cores and Buxton will be back and twins will win division!!! 

Watkins continues to be a poor 3B coach. How on earth does he not send Kepler on that play? Too often he sends guys who get thrown out? Twins need to move on from him.

[JD-TWINS]

11 hours ago, knothole61 said:

Crazy season...the Twins have been pretty awful for the past 10 days or so, while losing games in the most gut wrench of fashions. And yet...and yet, they find themselves just two losses behind the co-leaders of the A.L. Central!

It's kind of a miracle really. 

I admit that this may be pollyannaish to some degree, but I like the position that we are in. Even with a win tomorrow and a three game set with Pittsburgh coming up, I don't think that Cleveland can stop their slide--after all they will soon have to play six in a row on the road against KC and the Dodgers. In addition, the recent home stand debacle against the Royals, and their losing ways in general of late, must have fostered some serious doubts within the Guardians' organization and fan base. I think that KC will be the target for the Twins going forward (they look very solid right now) and not only do the Twins seem to have their number on the diamond this year, but they have only to end up tied with KC after 162 to take the Division.  

Win a tough one against Sale tomorrow and then take the next two series against Toronto and Tampa Bay and we'll roll into KC on September 6 in a strong position and with our destiny in our own hands. Despite the disappointments of the last several days, we have nothing to lose but our chains and a world to win-or something like that! 

 

   

Pretty sure the Twins are 5-2 v. the Royals with 6 games to go……..no guarantee of winning a 162 game tie quite yet.

[JD-TWINS]

Martin is clearly outmatched at the plate against a high test fastball - he looked rough in 2 straight opportunities with RISP and 2 outs. His CF play is definitely not pretty but he’ll get better…….a little reckless mentally. Gotta hit cut-off from 120 feet away - no leaping for balls and missing them by 2 feet. He’s high energy to a detriment in moments. He’ll get better.

Kepler’s blah base running approach is the norm. He often looks like he’s running on a sheet of ice between 2B & 3B….often! So, I’m not 100% blaming Max if he’s getting poor coaching from third base coach BUT if he isn’t looking back when he gets to 2B (essentially stopping) and he actually runs HARD to 3B, he scores easily.

Julien finally looks like a decent hitter and gets us within one and is on 2B with no outs…..Lewis has got to get him to 3B.

Lewis is in the slump that he doesn’t do! Trying to hit too many HR’s and not going other way at all…….IMO.

Tonkin and Boushley are not as good as Josh Winder, IMO. Hopefully, his 15 day minimum in St Paul will end soon!

Jax has been performing well in his role, whatever that might be game to game. No need to alter how he’s used. Guys gotta perform……there’s no Managing around that……Alcala & Duran need to be better!!’

[mnfireman]

4 minutes ago, JD-TWINS said:

Julien finally looks like a decent hitter and gets us within one and is on 2B with no outs…..Lewis has got to get him to 3B.

He has started to hit since his re-call on 8-16 - .300/.364/.367 (.731 OPS), but his defense has been horrible and has hurt the team too often.