Blue Jays 7, Twins 3: Byron Buxton Blast Not Enough to Overcome Avian Outburst

[Matt Braun]

Image courtesy of © Matt Blewett-Imagn Images

Box Score
Simeon Woods Richardson: 4 ⅔ IP, 9 H, 4 ER, 1 BB, 2 K
Home Runs: Byron Buxton (9)
Bottom 3 WPA: Simeon Woods Richardson (-0.410), Ryan Jeffers (-0.090), Josh Bell (-0.090)
Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

 

One day after the Great Night in Minnesota Sports, life went on. The Twins - by far the least glorious member of the previous day’s winning association - returned to Target Field to play the Blue Jays. Champagne and celebrations occurred elsewhere; at the ballpark, it was business as usual. 

That business was spearheaded by Simeon Woods Richardson, owner of the starting rotation’s most ghastly ERA. 2026 hasn’t been kind to him: the young righty has seen his swing-and-miss ability plummet while his earned runs have ballooned. He entered the day with 15 strikeouts. All season. Across 30 innings. Even a product of the public education system could see he had issues. Would they continue on Friday?

The two teams exchanged a gentleman’s shutout first inning before Toronto struck in the second. Two singles and a wild pitch placed runners at second and third. A chopper hit to Josh Bell should have cut off the runner to home. It did not. Bell unleashed a Tyler Rogers sinker that grew wings and flew beyond the grasp of catcher Victor Caratini, forcing the poor backstop into a Daulton Varsho collision as the ball caromed out of bounds, allowing the trailing runner to score as well.

The blunder gave the Blue Jays the early advantage, but Minnesota had a trick up its sleeve: Byron Buxton. Although considering his name was on the lineup hours before the game started, precisely how tricky his appearance was appears dubious. In any case, Buxton stepped up to the plate in the third, correctly guessed how a Patrick Corbin breaker would spin, and blasted the low-and-inside offering just over the left field wall, scoring two.

 

 

The good news ends there. For a time.

The Blue Jays flocked with two more in the fourth, two in the fifth, and… one in the seventh. Kazuma Okamoto homered twice. Woods Richardson tried in vain to find an offering that would fool Toronto’s hitters, yet hard contact followed him with each selection. He continued to stumble with two outs in the fourth before Derek Shelton called it a day for the hurler and went to his bullpen.

Meanwhile, Twins hitters could do little. Not nothing, but only a little. Corbin proved too tricky on Friday. As did Toronto’s onslaught of relievers—Minnesota did load the bases against Jeff Hoffman in the eighth, but a sacrifice fly served as the only run they could net off the struggling former closer.

They probably should have done more. Toronto sent Louis Varland out for the ninth. They didn't just rub salt in the wound: they widened the gash before dropping enough sodium to salt McDonald's French Fries for the next decade. Despite a pair of baserunners, Minnesota couldn't get a rally going, and they fell to the Blue Jays in a sloppy contest.

Notes:

Byron Buxton collected his 800th career MLB hit on Saturday. He has the 24th-most in Twins history. 

Austin Martin's .484 OBP leads MLB (min. 90 PA)

Brooks Lee is slashing .296/.345/.556 over his last seven games. 

Post-Game Interview:

What’s Next?
The Twins and Blue Jays continue their Great Northern Battle with a mid-day foray on Saturday. Connor Prielipp starts opposite Dylan Cease. First pitch is at 1:10 PM.

 

Bullpen Usage Spreadsheet

	MON	TUES	WED	THUR	FRI	TOT
Orze	0	0	28	0	33	61
Morris	40	0	0	19	0	59
Banda	0	0	22	14	0	36
Rogers	14	0	13	0	8	35
Garcia	0	23	0	0	9	32
Funderburk	0	15	0	0	0	15
Sands	0	13	0	0	0	13
Topa	0	0	0	12	0	12

 

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[thelanges5]

Love me some SWR but he’s not right. 

[soyouresayingtheresachance]

I feel like Sim may be headed to the bullpen whenever Abel is ready to come back. 

Lots of hits again, not enough runs. Other than Bucks HR, its all singles. Quite the power outage so far this season. 

[knothole61]

1 hour ago, thelanges5 said:

Love me some SWR but he’s not right. 

Man, those home run pitches were served up on a platter by SWR! On the bright side, Buxton is on pace for 44 home runs and we're still only 2 and one-half games back.

[Western SD Fan]

The last step of a decent starter seems to be how they can adapt to the lineup's game plan and how they can get out of trouble.  Sim seems to fail in his ability to bear down and get out of trouble.  I'm not sure if he loses focus, does not adapt, or is not confident in his pitches.  The first two runs were not Sim's fault.  You have a passed ball by Caratini and bad throw by Bell.  It's Sim's inability to control it once Buck ties the game that concerns me.  Until Abel comes back, we are stuck with him in the lineup and will likely be stuck with him even when Abel comes back since I believe he is out of options.  Whatever changes or potential removal to the bullpen will have to be done at the ML level.  I cannot imagine that Sim would survive the waiver wire as he is a typical 5th-type starter.  The problem the Twins have is that we have 2-3 of them right now (Prielipp, Abel when he comes back, and Sim).  The age-old excuse still rules:  roster construction and options still wag the dog and until the Twins feel comfortable in their pitching depth, Sim will still be out there.

  

[Parfigliano]

Bad SP.  Bad D.  Bad base running.  Surprised they lost.

[Werbellik]

To the author. Why the snide comment about public school education?

[Peter]

SWR will turn it around!!! Flush last night and get win today!!!

[CRF]

Sim just ain't cutting it. He needs a visit to StP. 

[mikelink45]

8 hours ago, soyouresayingtheresachance said:

I feel like Sim may be headed to the bullpen whenever Abel is ready to come back. 

Lots of hits again, not enough runs. Other than Bucks HR, its all singles. Quite the power outage so far this season. 

I think it is time for a reset for him and I would not wait even if Abel is not ready.  Give another arm a chance - maybe Zebby is ready again.

[mikelink45]

Five starters hitting under 230 in the lineup with Lewis and Outman fighting for last place - this will not work.  The calls for Outman to be replaced have been frequent, although Emma getting an injury hurts the momentum. Wallner has earned a replacement too - is Jenkins ready?  But Lewis!!!!!  Time for Culpepper to come up.  Lee to move over.  I remember the days when Lewis and Kiriloff were going to be the next superstars.  

[David Maro]

Here's an idea Wallner and Lewis get a Uber to St Paul when this series is over. Lewis is now showing the same issue as Wallner striking out 50% of the time. He also has developed a 1 hand swing and losing his balance at the same time. This team needs a shake up soon and this would be a good start.

[Linus]

Does Bell have a chronic shoulder injury?  When I first saw his underhand throwing I thought he was just messing around but I’ve not seen him throw overhand yet. That throw last night was ugly. 

[Matt Braun]

7 hours ago, Werbellik said:

To the author. Why the snide comment about public school education?

Cheap punching bag. Don't take it too seriously. Meant to be in the vein of Bert's "California math."

Edited Saturday at 02:13 PM by Matt Braun

[jmlease1]

did bot have SWR as the clear weakest link in the rotation on my dance card, but it is what it is. He needs to dig in and start figuring it out because he's the only one who isn't holding up his end of the bargain right now. Too hittable, too homer-happy, and not finishing off enough hitters with a K. His first 2 outings were solid enough, so I have to wonder if he's fighting something?

10 hits and 2 BB should push across more than 3 runs, but 1-5 with RISP and Buck was the only non-single. Martin continues to impress with his ability to get on base, and nice to see Lee provide a spark at the bottom of the lineup. But Caratini is in a massive slump right now (his last 2 weeks have been dreadful) and Keaschall still isn't producing anything.

[tony&rodney]

Plenty of notice that Simeon doesn't strike everyone out, but if the gloves turn batted balls into outs maybe things turn out differently. Hard to look critically at the pitchers as long as the defense is so poor. The Twins also had a rough night with the bats, with some weak plans. Worse, a few mental mistakes returned after the Twins had managed to stay away from them recently. I'll lay blame on pitchers once they don'y have to strike everyone out to gain an out.

[Riverbrian]

I hope Erod's thumb is OK. 

[JD-TWINS]

11 hours ago, soyouresayingtheresachance said:

I feel like Sim may be headed to the bullpen whenever Abel is ready to come back. 

Lots of hits again, not enough runs. Other than Bucks HR, its all singles. Quite the power outage so far this season. 

10th in MLB in HR’s (2nd a couple weeks ago) - scored most runs for Twins in month of April since 1996, per last night’s broadcast.

That said, I have been a leader bitching about the offense. I get it, there is no magic wand to level run production game to game……… (8 runs in a loss last week & 11 in a win) ……..Team was scoring runs and overcoming some, just OK pitching, to get to their 11-7 record. Over the last 15 games they are 3-12 & the previous run production has dropped! Pitching has stepped up “in general” - 4 great starts in a row heading into last night…… PEN has been spotty at best.

They haven’t scored enough in most games to have the PEN’s performance matter. 3 of last 10 games they have above 3 runs (5 games at 2 or less runs)……..can’t pitch well enough to succeed with that type of run production. 

[JD-TWINS]

1 hour ago, tony&rodney said:

Plenty of notice that Simeon doesn't strike everyone out, but if the gloves turn batted balls into outs maybe things turn out differently. Hard to look critically at the pitchers as long as the defense is so poor. The Twins also had a rough night with the bats, with some weak plans. Worse, a few mental mistakes returned after the Twins had managed to stay away from them recently. I'll lay blame on pitchers once they don'y have to strike everyone out to gain an out.

Offense needs to score, granted!

Gotta play decent defense, granted.

Zero to Zero score & SWR faced a .217 hitter with a guy on first and he had him 0-2. Then, as he has done repeatedly, he hung a splitter and the guy lined the ball to left center. Again, 0-2 count. Then a few pitches later, the ball went to the backstop (WP but Caratini needs to stop that pitch) and both guys move into scoring position. That lead to pulling the infield in to cut down the run at the plate on a ground ball……,. sharply hit ball to Bell and he choked and threw the ball out of play.

SWR certainly helped create a bad situation prior to ball hit to Bell. …… Bell should help bail him out though.

[Jacksson]

This loss is on Woods Richardson.  The bullpen, for the most part, did their job.

Seen after the game: a list of potential trade partners at the trade deadline for Josh Bell, DFA paperwork for Outman, paperwork showing options of: Caratini, Lewis, Keaschall and Woods Richardson to St Paul.