Phillies 7, Twins 5: This One Might Have Done It

[jkcarew]

56 minutes ago, tony&rodney said:

Or maybe parity has come to baseball. 

I’d just say mediocrity has come to an entire League…the AL. Combined with the fact that 40% of the league gets into the postseason since the introduction of 3 wildcard spots. Yes, Yankees playing a lot of the season with their B team.
 

The National league has been kicking the bejesus out of the AL in interleague…especially the ALC and ALW teams. Phillies came to town having just lost a series to the Cards. They were outside the NL wild card looking in and held a negative run differential. They dismantled the Twins in 3 straight…in Mpls…(except for a 2-out, 2- strike GS that made the last game look close-ish.) Twins now 13-26 against the NL…333 win PCT. Pretty easy argument can be made that the Twins (and probably at least a couple other AL wildcard “contenders”) would be dead last in both the NLC and NLE…and, in fact, the Twins lost both the Mets and Washington series, and were swept by the Reds and Pirates. There ain’t no parity in the NL. In the NL, if you aren’t actually good, you’re SOL.

[knothole61]

7 hours ago, jkcarew said:

Buxton absent or awful since June 15. There’s a reason. There’s been a reason virtually every single season of his career. And yet it continues to be an excuse for the team struggling down the stretch every single year. Insanity.

I'd call Buxton a mystery, but you are correct--he's really very predictable. He's occasionally brilliant, often injured, and prone to rather long slumps during which he seems incredibly easy to strike out on junk.

Before the break I was looking forward to watching Buxton challenge Killebrew's single-season home run record of 49, but I should have known better. He hasn't hit one since June 22 and he's stuck on 25. Almost two months without a homer, how amazing is that? Even considering his time on the IL it's amazing.

If things follow true to form he'll probably break out of his funk in from seven to ten games and become a world-beater again...let's see.