Jimcotta

Whether Popkins and crew where made scapegoats or not and whether or not they will follow the same hitting philosophies or not (they will), I am just glad a change was made. I don't care what any metric says, they were horrible in situational hitting. They were particularly pitiful with a runner on third and less than 2 outs and bases loaded.

You forgot my favorite, Santana. My gosh how many guys did he leave on base over the last 3 weeks. It got to be comical. Seemed like every game he was in the middle of a potential rally and did nothing. I don't know what his RBI-less streak was until last Wednesday but it had to be significant. Their inability to get a big knock in key situations was mind boggling. I know Kepler was hurting but why did he once again revert to that pull everything swing that has him rolling over on ground balls to second or weak fly balls to right. Did he forget that he had success up the middle and the other way last year? OK now I am ranting again. Why hasn't more been said about Duran barely hitting 100 this year and last year he was consistently at 102-103. Did I miss explanations of this? To me that was significant. Not that he was horrible but he still wasn't the same as a year ago. You have to wonder about the mood of the team after Lewis said again he ran out of gas and Correa saying that's a weak excuse. The younger guys must be thinking "Easy for you to say, you sat out half the year". It is a weak excuse though for the every day players. Every team is dinged up and tired. Why couldn't our guys push through. I do give a pass to Woods-Richardson, Festa and Matthews, especially SWR. For a pitcher, that many more innings has to wear you down.

First time poster here. I live in an area nearly void of Twins fans. Everyone is a Yankees fan and that's all they pay attention to. They couldn't care less about talking Twins baseball. Even my wife just nods her head politely, when I start rambling about the Twins. So I needed to write this for my own mental health. To vent to people who live and die with the team like I do. I can't even begin to grasp the magnitude of this collapse. How could the entire team tank like this for over a month? How could they be so bad in even the most basic of baseball skills? Has there ever been a worse base running team? A team so bad at situational hitting? What went wrong in the clubhouse that caused and prolonged this endless slump? Something did and I hope the front office makes it their mission to find out what it was and address it. I gave them a pass on the 2022 collapse. The roster was decimated by the end of the year but this year felt very different. Aside from the lack of execution on the field, something seems off with this squad that looked so good just a couple months ago. Unlike most posters here, I wouldn't mind if Rocco stayed but I wouldn't mind if he is fired either. What will upset me is if next season we have the same hitting coaches and 3rd base coach. There has to be a reason other teams are successful in bases loaded and no out situations and we are so terrible. That was on full display in the 12 inning loss to the Marlins. It was the same last year. Its time for some new voices on the offensive side. I won't even go into all the misguided sends from Watkins. That has been addressed plenty already. Right now I just want to see the team do something rash and impulsive. For once abandon their even keeled philosophy and do something to show fans that what has happened is unacceptable. You know what bugs me? Is that the national media has largely ignored the Twins collapse. If this were the Mets, Yankees, Red Sox or Dodgers, the collapse would be headline news every day. They have focused on the Tigers run, understandably so as it has been a great story. However, their hot streak is pretty meaningless had the Twins even played .500 ball over the last month (add the Royals into that as well). The only thing the national media says is "Poor Twins, too many injuries again this year.". That's baloney. Injuries were a factor in the collapse but certainly was not the main cause. Why aren't they pointing out the teams horrid performance in all aspects of the game? Why aren't they calling out the front office for going O-fer in trying to bolster the bullpen? Not to mention, as I said I am convinced something more was going on with this team but we will never really know what was happening in that clubhouse. I feel better (not really).