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    Guardians 3, Twins 2: Leaking Bullpen and Quiet Offense Costs Twins


    Matt Braun

    Jose Ramirez's home run off of Jhoan Duran in the eighth inning wins the game for Cleveland.

    Image courtesy of © David Richard-USA TODAY Sports

    Twins Video

    Box Score
    Starting Pitcher: Simeon Woods Richardson: 5 ⅓ IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 1 K
    Home Runs: Alex Kirilloff (3)
    Bottom 3 WPA: Jhoan Duran (-.237), Steven Okert (-.225), Ryan Jeffers (-.186)
    Win Probability Chart (via FanGraphs)

    If you successfully navigated the mess of streaming services and various “+” outlets—perhaps communicating with a younger relative to successfully accrue a login—a pitcher’s duel served as your reward for finding the game. Considering the matchup, this was unusual; Simeon Woods Richardson exited Canada with a far higher ERA than he entered the country with, and Triston McKenzie has so far walked a small island nation to start 2024. Naturally, both men excelled. 

    The opening play should have tipped us off: Edouard Julien smoked a liner to center just to watch Tyler Freeman take off with the grace of a sprinter and dive perfectly to snag the ball. 

    Things settled, at least for a time. The sudden excitement did not portend absurdity. Rather, the game lulled itself into quiet, sporadic neutrality, only occasionally broken when a Twins baserunner evaporated through double play means. Such a play happened three times in three innings. So it goes.

    But one of those twin killers came following good news: Alex Kirilloff homered. The streak was over. The Dust Bowl fruitlessness carried through the Yankees series crumbled when the lefty caught up to a high fastball and deposited it over the right-center wall.

    A few odds and ends happened in the middle innings—Kirilloff was later picked off first; Cleveland caught Carlos Correa shifting too far, certainly the only game in which both occurrences have ever been observed—but the result never wavered. The match stayed at a 1-0 advantage while Woods Richardson stood on the mound. The issue? He was in the dugout in the 6th. Steven Okert entered, coaxed an out, then threw a slider that forgot to break into the dirt, allowing David Fry to greet the offering with a home run swing. 2-1 Guardians. No win for Woods Richardson. 

    Commiserating wasn't on the menu for Minnesota, though. While those watching at home groaned and complained, the Twins worked up a skirmish in the 8th. Jose Miranda singled. The pinch-runner, Austin Martin, swiped 2nd. Rocco Baldelli's infamous Platoon Preference (TM) arrived when Kyle Farmer entered to face the lefty Tim Herrin. It worked. The veteran stroked a double into the gap to tie the game. 

    Maybe it's no surprise that something so rare turned out to be so tragically short-lived. Baldelli invoking his human trump card meant nothing to José Ramírez. Jhoan Duran hung a curve just a touch too high, and the forever thorn in Minnesota's side struck once again. Home run. Cleveland leads. Ballgame. 

    Notes: Byron Buxton, who has been on the injured list and played a couple of days on a rehab assignment in St. Paul on Wednesday and Thursday, is in Cleveland with the team. It is expected that he'll be activated and play on Saturday. 

    The Twins and Guardians will play the second game of their series on Saturday. First pitch is at 5:10 PM. Bailey Ober faces off against Logan Allen. 

     

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    3 minutes ago, stringer bell said:

    I thought he was inches on the SS side, but the people in New York get more angles. 

    If a positioning call is as important as a fair/foul ball, paint a stripe on the ground. Remove all doubt on the field and review booth as it is a cut and dry rule, not a judgment call.

    When a major league team isn’t hitting, they don’t look good. The Twins mistakesxof the past days would be largely papered over if they were scoring five runs a game. Sadly, they are not. 
     

    Most of the hits that SWR allowed were softly hit, while the Twins hit a couple of missiles and also GDPed three times. The strikeouts haven’t been off the charts, but not enough (almost none) of the hitters are clicking. 

    3 hours ago, Whitey333 said:

    It's so disgusting to watch major league umpires calling balls and strikes.  But having said that it's just as disgusting, maybe more so, to have the Twins announcers, manager, and fans continually blame the losses on bad luck, bad bounces, and bad umpiring.  Yes I agree it was it's normally bad self.  But only getting 4 hits a game isn't going to cut it.  What's frustrating is that MLB does nothing to improve home plate umpiring.  They should at least look into it.  

    I get the fan’s reactions - it’s pretty frustrating (as you know) to see a guy steal 2B and have Castro TAKE ball 4 to get us to two on with one out………………only to have the ump call it strike 3. One guy on base with two outs - completely changes the feel of the inning!!! Ball was BOTH low and outside……..as you mention, there has to be a way to use something, maybe a challenge system a couple times per game?

    The fact that we hit into 3 double plays through 3 innings has as much or more to do with the loss than anything.

    Baldelli "to have all those calls go against us" yeah, but if the Twins took some professional at bats and didn't make careless mistakes, the calls wouldn't have mattered. Correa was clearly in violation. His entire left foot was over the second base edge when you line up home plate and 2nd base and account for the camera angle.correafoot.jpg.ccd5c7a8cef226785f729c4a05cc4707.jpg

    It wasn't the umpire's fault Kirilloff got caught sleeping off first base.

    Calls against the Twins
    Miranda had a bad first pitch strike called in the 8th. This was the first bad call that went against the Twins hitters all night.
    Castro then had a bad third pitch strike called in the 8th right behind him on what should have been ball 4.
    Correa got a bad strike three called on what should have been a walk in the 9th.
    Duran got hosed vs. Ramirez in the 8th. Ball 1 and Ball 2 were both strikes, the swing on 3 should have been strike out, instead we get to see a home run.

    Correa got the benefit of a 2-1 count instead of a 1-2 count when the ump missed a strike call in the top of the 5th. Struck out anyway.
    Correa got the benefit again in the 7th taking a walk on what should have been 3-2.

    Those are the 7 pitches the ump blew against Twins hitters, 2 calls for the Twins, 5 calls against them.

    Everything was pretty great up until the late innings when he got awfully sloppy.


     

    16 minutes ago, bean5302 said:

    Baldelli "to have all those calls go against us" yeah, but if the Twins took some professional at bats and didn't make careless mistakes, the calls wouldn't have mattered. Correa was clearly in violation. His entire left foot was over the second base edge when you line up home plate and 2nd base and account for the camera angle.correafoot.jpg.ccd5c7a8cef226785f729c4a05cc4707.jpg

    It wasn't the umpire's fault Kirilloff got caught sleeping off first base.

    Calls against the Twins
    Miranda had a bad first pitch strike called in the 8th. This was the first bad call that went against the Twins hitters all night.
    Castro then had a bad third pitch strike called in the 8th right behind him on what should have been ball 4.
    Correa got a bad strike three called on what should have been a walk in the 9th.
    Duran got hosed vs. Ramirez in the 8th. Ball 1 and Ball 2 were both strikes, the swing on 3 should have been strike out, instead we get to see a home run.

    Correa got the benefit of a 2-1 count instead of a 1-2 count when the ump missed a strike call in the top of the 5th. Struck out anyway.
    Correa got the benefit again in the 7th taking a walk on what should have been 3-2.

    Those are the 7 pitches the ump blew against Twins hitters, 2 calls for the Twins, 5 calls against them.

    Everything was pretty great up until the late innings when he got awfully sloppy.


     

    Ump missed an obvious strike 3 call to Ramirez in the 6th, allowing both the AB to continue and Gimenez to wind up on third due to the pitch in the dirt and bad throw to second. IF Gimenez is still on first Naylor MAY have hit into an inning ending DP and the game is still 1-0 Twins at that point. A bigger turning point than the missed calls to Castro or Correa.

    The positioning point for the defender is the center of the base, not the edges.

    image.png.bb8efff53ea4d9276d05cdcf3a9acfe5.png

    4 hours ago, Karbo said:

    My friend down in St. Pete Had to call me this morning just to ask if I still love Okert. He said he was so glad they found someone to dump him on. He told me at the time of the trade how happy he was to see him go. Now I'm starting to see why.

    That was my impression when we got him. He definitely shouldn't be trusted with a close game. 

     

    CLE is a good team. Great overall pitching & defense. IMO the Ramirez HR didn't cost us it was the Fry HR. That HR shouldn't have happened if Jeffers hadn't made that errant throw to 2B after 2B was stolen. No one was backing up 2B & was slow to get to it. That advanced the runner with only 1 out & forced SWR out of game in favor of (LHP) Okert to pitch to (LH) Naylor. Okert got Naylor out but Okert was obligated to pitch to Fry which cost us 2 runs.

    3 hours ago, wabene said:

    Agree with all this except during the streak the Twins jumped all over some good starters from the Mariners and Red Sox.

    I realize this is circular logic, and would require some heavy-duty research and database skills that I lack, but even good starters have outings where they go to the mound and discover they have nothing that day.  That would be the simple explanation for Bailey Ober's game log this season, for example - Kansas City (who clobbered him) has a similar up-and-down profile as our Twins.  One of the skills in data analysis is how to deal with outliers - amateurs simply discard them, pros figure out a framework for the particular data.  (I consider myself somewhere in the middle on that, LOL.)   I'll stand by my perception of how our team's approach to batting fares from one day to the next.  Not every team is like that - the Phillies so far this year have been really tough to shut down, so they seem to have a Plan B for pitchers who are making their pitches.

    10 minutes ago, ashbury said:

    I realize this is circular logic, and would require some heavy-duty research and database skills that I lack, but even good starters have outings where they go to the mound and discover they have nothing that day.  That would be the simple explanation for Bailey Ober's game log this season, for example - Kansas City (who clobbered him) has a similar up-and-down profile as our Twins.  One of the skills in data analysis is how to deal with outliers - amateurs simply discard them, pros figure out a framework for the particular data.  (I consider myself somewhere in the middle on that, LOL.)   I'll stand by my perception of how our team's approach to batting fares from one day to the next.  Not every team is like that - the Phillies so far this year have been really tough to shut down, so they seem to have a Plan B for pitchers who are making their pitches.

    I agree, but some lineups are more talented and I see multiple factors. The Twins got hot and gained confidence that helped against the better teams, but some lineups gutted by platooning fizzed that out right quick.

    3 hours ago, mnfireman said:

    I can't upload the screen shot, but to me Correa's positioning seemed within the rules, unless the camera angle behind home plate was slightly off. The line goes directly across second base, corner to corner, and Correa's feet appear to be slightly to the SS side of the base. His body is leaning to his glove side, but, to me, his feet , and thus his positioning, appear legal.

    This is a situation where several different people's judgment came into play; the fielder, the umpiring crew, the opposing manager and, upon appeal, the umpire in the review office. The HP umpire, looking directly at Correa did not call it. I know his focus is on the P, but pre-pitch he can see fielder positioning. The 2B umpire, standing six feet from Correa did not call it. The opposing manager, from the 3B dugout, at field level, makes a challenge and the play is reversed (good for him).

    MLB has dropped the ball on this rule. They need to take the judgment calls out of this and paint a stripe behind second base before this decides a more important game.

    Perhaps my vision is going. But it looked pretty clear to me that Correas left foot was beyond where the rule states. The baseball gods were smiling on Ramirez.  3 outs in 1 AB plus game winning homer. Duran not trusting his best stuff. Seems I remember he did something similar last year. I forget the hitter. Umpiring can be complained about till the cows come home. But when you only score 1 off a very beatable McKenzie the umpires didn't lose the game. Spilled milk.

    it's not Duran not trusting his staff.....he wasn't shaking anyone off.  He's going with what our catchers call.

    In the Yankees series, there was a call that was eventually overturned where the Yankees were late in asking for a challenge.  Someone on here said that there is "wriggle room" (or something like that) with the challenge clock.

    Well....is there "wriggle room" in regard to that rule, but not regarding the shift.  If Correa violated the rule, it was by inches.  It must've been close because the challenge took a long time to be decided.  If they are gonna call it that close, there should be a line.  

    Rules are rules, right?

    On 5/18/2024 at 1:30 PM, mnfireman said:

    Ump missed an obvious strike 3 call to Ramirez in the 6th, allowing both the AB to continue and Gimenez to wind up on third due to the pitch in the dirt and bad throw to second. IF Gimenez is still on first Naylor MAY have hit into an inning ending DP and the game is still 1-0 Twins at that point. A bigger turning point than the missed calls to Castro or Correa.

    The positioning point for the defender is the center of the base, not the edges.

    image.png.bb8efff53ea4d9276d05cdcf3a9acfe5.png

    With the new rule changes, defensive teams will be required to have a minimum of four players on the infield, with at least two infielders completely on either side of second base

    It's not from the center of the base. It's from the "side" of the base, the graphic is imperfect showing 1 line instead of 2. Correa was in violation. Not seeing this "strike 3" error you're talking about. 

    ramirez6th.jpg




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