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The Twins desperately needed a good start this year to generate some enthusiasm following a stretch of four consecutive horrible seasons and a deflating development involving their top free agent acquisition just before Opening Day.
Unfortunately, the first week has played out in the opposite fashion. One could hardly imagine a worse start to this 2015 campaign, as the first week of games has seen the Twins win just one of seven. For the most part, this club hasn't even been competitive.
Some of the struggles are tied up in slumps that seem unlikely to extend much further. But this is a roster that was constructed sub-optimally from the start, as Twins decision-makers opted for veteran mediocrity over youthful upside in almost every possible instance.
With that plan blowing up in the worst way, how long will Terry Ryan, Paul Molitor and Co. stick to their guns? How patient can they be before implementing major shakeups to prevent things from getting out of hand?
One could paint the idea of drastic roster overhauls after one week of games as an overreaction, but in this case the horrors that have played out on the field only help to confirm the dubiousness of several choices made at the end of spring.
In a sense, it's unfair to cast judgment on Blaine Boyer or Tim Stauffer or the current center field duo for struggling in such a small sample, especially with the team at large failing on almost every level. But these are easily addressed problems, where the solution is almost certain to pay better short-term and long-term dividends. What benefit is there to continually trotting out a veteran like Boyer or Shane Robinson?
The minor-leaguers have done their parts in an even smaller slate of games. Aaron Hicks has an OPS above 1.000 through four games at Triple-A and Josmil Pinto is over .800 as usual. The Rochester bullpen, which includes several seemingly MLB-ready arms, has not allowed a run.
Sample size be damned, it seems flat-out strange that these players are putting up numbers in Triple-A after being eschewed for ill-equipped vets that look overmatched in the majors.
If things continue the way they're going, the Twins will face some tougher decisions. How long can Oswaldo Arcia continue to stumble around in left field while looking utterly awful at the plate? How lengthy is Kyle Gibson's leash if he keeps delivering starts that remotely resemble his first one? Can J.R. Graham be trusted to overcome his control woes and get outs?
But those potentially long-term building blocks deserve more patience than veteran journeyman bench players and relievers who probably shouldn't have been on the roster to begin with, and carry little if any value beyond this season. Clear them out, and replace them with viable young players to energize this grossly underperforming squad.
I'm not necessarily convinced that a roster with Hicks, Pinto, Michael Tonkin, Ryan Pressly and others is going to be substantially better, but it could hardly be worse and at the very least it gives fans something worth tuning into.
At this point, that's got to be a major concern for this club.
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