TOR 7, MIN 5: Twins Can’t Recover After Another Poor Start by Lynn

I never miss your recaps, they are much appreciated. And it has to be hard to write them after two weeks of this kind of baseball ...

 

But Garver has been horrific. His fundamentals are just plain lousy. Not only did he give up those two runs, but with the he bases loaded he one handed a short hop pitch just to his right hip area, never got down to block it at all. He caught it, but it wasn't due to any overt effort. You just cannot catch in MLB that way. He does seem to be able to throw. But watching him catch is almost painful.

Thank you for reading. These are definitely more fun when the team is winning, but what can you do? At least April's over, I guess.

I'm a big Garver supporter, but I agree that he didn't look great, and it was for more than just those two plays that really stood out. He wasn't getting his body in front of pitches, as you mentioned, and appeared to get his signals crossed up multiple times.

Rosario looks bored in LF. Terrible body language. Four errors -- happy he gets the right zip code on his throws ...

 

What is up with Dozier? No arm. Now going into one of those half-season funks with the bat?

Dang, I didn't realize that was already four errors for Rosie. Fewer than 30 OFers had more errors than that all of last season.

I wonder if Dozier's not 100%. He's not moving around great, either. Along with the error, he dove for a ball to his left in the eighth I thought he typically would have been able to field on his feet. He also booted it, allowing the runner to get an infield single. 

I am a big believer that attitude has a very large impact on a team and Rosario may be the window into team feelings.  Right now Escobar and Kepler are the two who really look competitive.  Mauer would not be one of the bad attitude guys, but he never shows fire, he is just Joe.

 

However, the FO was going to take charge of attitude with Hunter, Cuddyer, Morneau...and I do not remember how many ex-Twins who could infuse the team with positive energy.  Has anyone seen them around the team the last two weeks?  Are they simply telling stories and entertaining the FO?

 

I  said that the team turn around was still Terry Ryan's team.  The team on the field right belongs to this FO - and I was not a TR fan, but I have not become a Falvine fan either. 

You can tell even from a distance there's some not great vibes around this team right now. Nobody likes losing. I agree that psychology/mentality probably plays a bigger role in things than we even realize, but I feel like you can only accomplish so much in the clubhouse. This team needs a blowout victory, an easy day at the office just to loosen everybody up.

There are a lot of players who may have carried over some negative feelings from over the winter, which can't help. The majority of the free agents brought in were expecting to have signed for more. Dozier was dissatisfied with any extension talks that happened, he's obviously a big figure in the clubhouse. I also think there's something missing on the pitching side with Ervin out.

There are a ton of players on this club who are in their contract year. That can motivate some guys, it can cause others to put too much pressure on themselves.

The most encouraging thing I saw last night from an attitude perspective was Max Kepler being fired up about his ninth inning double, showing some emotion while looking toward the dugout and trying to energize some of his teammates.

Max has always seemed like a pretty chill guy, but this team needs a kick in it's arse and I think the best place for that to come from is an everyday player who's on a hot streak like Max is right now. Hopefully he delivers a big hit early in tonight's game and continues to try and light a fire under the rest of the guys, but he and Escobar can't do it all by themselves.

Obviously the pitching has been bad, but if the offense gets rolling that takes a lot of pressure off everybody both on the mound and in the field.