Guardians 4, Twins 3: Yet Another Wet Slap

Buxton gets on base to lead off the 9th and watches at least four pitches go by without moving, and then Larnach grounds into a double play.  He needs to be on second base after one pitch.  And then third base after two pitches.  So what if Herrin is a lefty.  That’s his job—he has to steal.

No excuses.  The Guardians just flat out out executed us when it mattered.  Whether it was moving runners over, stealing a base, running the bases, throwing out runners, etc.

Again, it’s not rocket science.  Play a clean game, do the little things better, have strong fundamentals.  The Guardians are just better at those things than the Twins.  Those things matter - a lot! And it’s fairly obvious.  And it’s why they beat us more often (ok, virtually all the time, especially in Cleveland) in close games.  

Sometimes you gotta feel a bit sorry for the lads. Bullpen did their job, a lot of good at-bats…but not enough came with RISP. Got the ground ball that you need in the 10th, and it finds the whole. It was a less hopeless, but more frustrating, way to not score enough. Well, at least the flight to Boston is a short one.

"An unfathomable stretch of heartbreak..." 

Eh, not really. The Twins needed 3 outs to push a Manfred runner across in the 10th. That included said runner misreading a single up the middle and another runner being thrown out at 2B. Although in fairness, with Vazquez in the box at the time it likely doesn't make a difference.

Cleveland needed 1 out (a productive out that moved the Manfred runner to 3B) to score 2 runs on 2 hits with an intentional BB sprinkled in. They swiped 2 bases in the process. 

That's pretty much all you need to know when wondering why the Twins have such a poor record in these close games. 

I said it in the game thread, the poor showing vs. Cleveland isn't some anomaly. The Twins aren't snakebitten, this isn't "bad luck." Bad teams find ways to lose games, and we've seen this club play a lot of pretty bad baseball over the last few years. 

Count me in among those that were optimistic about the 2025 Twins. Not sure where I stand right now? Performance is not matching the talent level, especially on offense. What is their identity? Who can they turn to to pick them up and lead them out of this prolonged slump?

5 minutes ago, Nashvilletwin said:

No excuses.  The Guardians just flat out out executed us when it mattered.  Whether it was moving runners over, stealing a base, running the bases, throwing out runners, etc.

Again, it’s not rocket science.  Play a clean game, do the little things better, have strong fundamentals.  The Guardians are just better at those things than the Twins.  Those things matter - a lot! And it’s fairly obvious.  And it’s why they beat us more often (ok, virtually all the time, especially in Cleveland) in close games.  

Rocco

I want to hear another post game interview session with Rocco...about as much as I want to do another colonoscopy prep. Cleve just owns us...it's as simply as that. 

3 minutes ago, thelanges5 said:

Count me in among those that were optimistic about the 2025 Twins. Not sure where I stand right now? Performance is not matching the talent level, especially on offense. What is their identity? Who can they turn to to pick them up and lead them out of this prolonged slump?

Performance IS matching the talent level. That's why most Twins fans were disappointed in the offseason. This team has minimal talent at best. But I keep reading about how much talent we have. Where is it?

Only 3 runs on 13 hits?!

My expert opinion: Uffff Daaaahhhh

Can’t beat Cleveland if our lives depended on it. Frustrating series as we should’ve taken all 4. Need to bounce back and take series against Red Sox-once Royce/castro/Wallner comeback we should be good. 

33 minutes ago, AlwaysinModeration said:

Buxton gets on base to lead off the 9th and watches at least four pitches go by without moving, and then Larnach grounds into a double play.  He needs to be on second base after one pitch.  And then third base after two pitches.  So what if Herrin is a lefty.  That’s his job—he has to steal.

Consider me one of the many that are completely unimpressed by the fact that Buxton has the highest stolen base percentage for this very reason. He's a good baserunner, but how he's never been a SB threat in his career is wild. 

3-21 with the bases loaded but we are 15th with RISP. So many fun stats out there 🤮

SWR needs to head to the bullpen. Will be a good long reliever or mop up man.

 Booo this team. 

25 minutes ago, Hubie29 said:

Performance IS matching the talent level. That's why most Twins fans were disappointed in the offseason. This team has minimal talent at best. But I keep reading about how much talent we have. Where is it?

Yeah, how so many fans deluded themselves into thinking this team was a quasi contender. This team never had any positional depth. Even if the roster was fully healthy, they're still rostering, and therefore playing, the likes of Keirsey and Gasper and regularly starting replacement level players like Julien, Miranda, Larnach, and France. 

How the projections didn't see that massive lack of depth and get to 77-78 wins is a puzzle. 

13 minutes ago, NYCTK said:

Yeah, how so many fans deluded themselves into thinking this team was a quasi contender. This team never had any positional depth. Even if the roster was fully healthy, they're still rostering, and therefore playing, the likes of Keirsey and Gasper and regularly starting replacement level players like Julien, Miranda, Larnach, and France. 

How the projections didn't see that massive lack of depth and get to 77-78 wins is a puzzle. 

Somebody has to win the ALC. You could realistically make the same quasi contender argument for all 4 of MN, Det, KC, and Cleveland. MN has pretty good SP, and it's been healthy (for the most part) the last few years. Add in Chicago being a lifeless punching back 13x, eh, I can see a mid 80s preseason projection. 

Agreed that the talent level is consistently overrated here. My hopes for the 2025 postseason rested primarily on the rest of the division crashing out a la 2023 rather than the Twins becoming something they aren't.