Twins Notes: Top Ten Plays

Top of the 1^st Inning

#2 – Miguel Sano doubles, scoring Mauer for the Twins to take a 1-0 lead.(+10.9%)

#1 – Trevor Plouffe homers, driving in Sano to give the Twins a 3-0 lead. (+17.0%)

The two biggest plays of the game happened within the first five at-bats. That’s both good and bad news. It means the Twins jumped on Cleveland starting pitcher Corey Kluber early, but it also means they were awfully quiet later. The Twins “two-out ambush” - as manager Paul Molitor labeled it - was accomplished entirely by the Twins three best hitters this year with runners in scoring position: Mauer (.935 OPS with RISP) doubled, Sano (1.011 OPS with RISP) did too and Plouffe. (944 OPS with RISP) hit his 22^nd home run. Call it luck or a brilliant batting order or clutch-erific clutchiness; it worked tonight.

Bottom of the 1^st Inning

#4 – Francisco Lindor homers, drawing the Indians with two runs, 3-1. (-8.7%)

As encouraging as the top of the first inning was, the Twins were still starting a pitcher who had recently been out with a sore shoulder and hadn’t started a game the last two turns through the rotation. Plus, he got knocked around silly in that start, lasting just 1.1 innings.

If Milone’s shoulder was still bothering him, it didn’t show. He was aggressive, and after that 3-2 home run he gave up to Lindor, he retired 14 of his next 16 batters. The Twins said last week he would come out of the bullpen the rest of the year, but this raises the question: could he help out this stretched rotaion? Here’s how the next few games look:

I’m sure there will be those who say Milone should start over Pelfrey, but the guy I’m most worried about is Phil Hughes, who doesn’t have his velocity back yet. Could Milone take Hughes’ (presumed) Saturday start and give Hughes a good two weeks to recover? Could Milone pitch a Game 163 versus the Angels, who have struggled against left-handed pitching this year? Could Hughes take Duffey’s start to save the Twins some innings on his arm? And what of Gibson’s last few starts? Could he use a couple of extra days of recovery?

As positively as tonight’s start impacted the Twins playoff hopes, I wonder if the flexibility of having Milone back won’t be more impactful in the future.

Top of the 2^nd Inning

#9 – Torii Hunter doubles to right field to lead off the second inning. (+4.7%)

#7 – Torii Hunter picked off of second base (-6.4%)

Ugh. It looks like the umpires blew this call and it isn’t clear the Twins coaching staff didn’t, too. Hunter was originally called safe getting back to the bag but the call was reversed upon review. But there are two things about that review:

First, I personally didn’t think the review showed indisputable proof that he really was out. But maybe there was a camera angle I couldn’t see. But more damning was that a review isn’t supposed to happen after the pitcher is on the rubber and the batter is in the batter’s box. That happened. But the home plate umpire was looking to the Cleveland dugout and didn’t see it and granted the review. Also, from watching it on television I didn’t see the Twins coaching staff objecting before the review took place.

By the way, credit Dick Bremer of Fox Sports North being all over that nuance of the call. I would not have noticed and it wasn’t clear anyone else associated with the broadcast did, either. He called it out, and FSN responded, showing exactly what he was talking about.

That pickoff play short-circuited a possible rally that could have drastically changed the game. It will mostly be forgotten after the win, but the Twins had runners on first and second base with no outs when it happened. Also, Kluber looked to be on the ropes. He ended up lasting six innings.

Top of the 4^th Inning

#10 – Eddie Rosario doubled to left to lead off the inning (+4.7%)

Rosario eventually came around to score on a Brian Dozier sacrifice fly to give the Twins a crucial insurance run. I just think it’s interesting that his initial hit improved the Twins chances of winning the game by 4.7%, while Dozier’s sac fly only improved their chances by 1.6%. That makes sense to me; the lead-off double is the hard part. The sac fly is just doing one’s job. But I wonder if most see it that way.

Bottom of the 6^th Inning

Jason Kipnis tripled to left to lead off the sixth inning. (-9.1%)

This is the hit that cost Milone his 10^th “quality start” of the season. He handled it well; Kipnis scored on the next batter to make the score 4-2, but Milone retired that batter and the one following. However Molitor, having watched Milone throw 82 pitches, decided he had pushed his luck enough. Blain Boyer came in to get the final out of the inning.

We probably aren’t giving Milone enough credit for the success he’s had this year. He lost about a month to a demotion to Rochester, where he absolutely dominated. He’s missed a little time to some injuries, but came back strong both times. He’s got a 4.04 ERA, has made 21 starts, threw 117 innings, and is within a couple of outs of having as many quality starts as Phil Hughes, Mike Pelfrey and Ervin Santana.

The biggest improvement in the Twins starting rotation is that they’ve been getting decent starts from the back of their rotation. Unlike previous years, they haven’t had fill-in players that were just getting hopelessly shelled, throwing away games. Milone, Trevor May and Duffey (and I suppose, to a lesser extent, even Ricky Nolasco) all get credit for that improvement.

Bottom of the 8^th Inning

Mike Aviles (vs. Glen Perkins) leads off the inning with a single to CF (-7.6%)

Jason Kipnis struck out looking (+6.5%)

Francisco Lindor struck out swingin (+5.0%)

We haven’t seen Glen Perkins in a game since Friday’s gut punch, but with May still not available (although he sounds close), Perkins came in to protect a 4-2 lead. It didn’t start well. But back-to-back strikeouts gave an optimistic feel to the outing. His pitches to Lindor, all of which were sliders, gave hope beyond just this one hold, especially that third one.

The Twins have plenty to overcome just to make the playoffs, let alone to advance beyond the wild card game and make a meaningful run. But getting May and Perkins back and healthy to join Kevin Jepsen (who was excellent again tonight) could go a long way to stealing some close games this postseason. This outing should have reminded Twins fans there is still promise on that front.

The plays and percentages in this story come from FanGraphs, an excellent resource for tracking the probability of your favorite team winning or losing a game, as well as seeing the impact of particular plays on the outcome of a game. Last night’s Twins win can be found here.