A Bunch of Dogs.

P.M. Update: Carlos Quentin may be done for the year!

On a night when I couldn't have cared less whether the Twins won or lost, they played so poorly that it ruined the NFL's opening night for me. And that's hard to do, considering I have Brandon Jacobs (21 car., 116 yards) and Plaxico Burress (10 rec., 133 yards) on a few fantasy teams, and they played pretty well. What a bunch of quitters. We'll need more fight than this to overtake the White Sox, who are now 1.5 games up on our beloved baseball club.

Quick stats:

1. Minnesota pitchers tossed just 2/3 of an inning that didn't scare me.
2. Twins batters combined for just four hits against Jesse Litsch, who has a season WHIP of nearly 1.300. That means we should of at least gotten 6-8 hits over nine innings, because our hitters are relative underachievers. Four hits? Barf.
   
3. The team scored 4.71 runs per night during the 14-game road trip, but scored zero runs yesterday.
4. After notching runs vs. such prominent pitchers as John Lackey, AJ Burnett and Ervin Santana, the Twins allowed Litsch to baffle them. Unbelievable.
5. Justin Morneau and Alexi Casilla both left a total of three men on base.
   

Here's how it happened: Kevin Slowey gave up 10 hits over 5 2/3 innings while striking out three. He only gave up three runs, which - in theory - gives the team a chance to win, especially after Craig Breslow (good 1/3 inning) struck out Toronto's Joe Inglett to end the inning. Thing is, Slowey was ineffective. Ten baserunners in less than six innings? That means he got lucky, folks. But with the way he's been pitching lately, I can't be all that mad. Of course, Jesse Crain came in and gave up a homer - that's 5 ER in his past 3 2/3 IP (uh, oh). Then came the other solid 1/3 of an inning from Dennys Reyes, who got Adam Lind to ground out. From there, Bobby Korecky (3H, 1BB, 4 ER, 1/3 IP) and Phil Humber (3H, 1 ER, 2/3 IP) brought us home with an abysmal five-run eighth inning to give Toronto a comfortable 9-0 lead. Hopefully that wasn't as frustrating to read as it was to write.

Of the Twins' four hits, Denard Span accounted for half of them, including a leadoff single that was completely wasted by Casilla's follow-up double-play ball. The team didn't even manage a baserunner after the fifth inning. That's right, Jesse-freaking-Litsch retired the final 13 batters.

And with that, the 5-9 road trip comes to an end. A bitter, trying end. And the Twins return home with their tails between their legs, beaten to a pulp by a middle-of-the-road team.

But the great thing about baseball is that you move on to the next day, the next team, the next series. The team needs a clean slate and some familiar scenery. Maybe the Metrodome will cure what ails. Minnesota faces Armando Galarraga (12-4, 3.17 ERA) Friday, Justin Verlander (10-15, 4.74 ERA) Saturday and Chris Lambert (0-1, 6.75 ERA) Sunday. For the Twins, Francisco Liriano (4-3, 3.45 ERA), Scott Baker (8-4, 3.66 ERA) and Glen Perkins (12-3, 4.08 ERA) will try and keep the Tigers at bay until the bullpen collapses in eventual Twins losses. Please guys - Joe Nathan, Crain, Reyes, Bonser, Breslow, etc. - prove me wrong.

Thanks for reading, and have a nice weekend! I'll try to write once, but it's no guarantee with the first Sunday of the NFL season + another college football Saturday coming up. I'm pretty much comatose from 11 a.m. Saturday to 10 p.m. Monday every week.

Casilla back... Angels await

Francisco Liriano is scaring me. You look at his 4-0 record, 1.14 ERA, .182 opponent batting average and very good 20 strikeouts in 23 2/3 innings, and it feels good. It feels like Liriano is back. But he's not, and we all know it. The same dominance just isn't there - he's not throwing as hard as he was before, and might not ever get all the way back (yes, we all knew this was a possibility). Even more disturbing though, are the 10 walks in those near-24 innings. Folks, our "golden boy" is having trouble finding the strike zone, and though he'll miss the Angels and continue "tuning up" vs. the whipping boys of the American League for a bit, there's going to come a time when a patient team eats him alive. A few more Liriano stats:

• He's thrown 401 pitches in 23 2/3 innings, which is about 17 pitches an inning - pretty inefficient. His fellow starters' numbers over the past four starts... Perkins (14.88 per inning), Slowey (16.01), Baker (16.8), Blackburn (15.4). Basically, he's giving himself the worst chance of ALL of our starters to go 6+ innings. Even Scott Baker, who's obviously struggling, has been a bit better.
• While Liriano has thrown about 61% of his pitches for strikes since "The Call-up", fellow Twins starters have faired much better - Baker (69.6%), Slowey (68.6%), Blackburn (64.3%), Perkins (69.1%).

Anyway, despite all this, I went to bed last night with a good feeling - the Twins had won their fourth consecutive series, and six out of their past seven games. The starting pitching is looking decent and the bats lively... even the bullpen looked good yesterday. What's more, Alexi "it's a miracle" Casilla (4-for-7, RBI in two rehab starts) is back from his hand injury and will look to help spark the top of the order where Nick Punto faltered. The Twins optioned Brian Bass to Triple-A Rochester to make room. Good riddance. Casilla's at bats are much better than anything we have in the middle infield, and we have to hope he can hit the ground running this evening.

Conversely, I woke up this morning and that feeling was all washed away... I mean, we're going to Anaheim...we're facing John Lackey tonight... we're a game back in the Central Division. Our starters have to deal with Vlad/Tex/Hunter for four games... our hitters - if there's to be a comeback win - will have to hit vs. the only guy better than our closer in Francisco Rodriguez. It's a brutal way to start a road trip, but I suppose it's best to get the worst over with first.

Game 1, tonight at 9:05 p.m. CST, will feature Scott Baker (7-3, 3.91 ERA) vs. John Lackey (10-2, 3.22 ERA), and tomorrow evening Glen Perkins (10-3, 4.17) will take on 14-game winner Joe Saunders (14-5, 3.14). Saturday's pitching probables are Nick Blackburn (9-7, 3.71) and Jon Garland (11-8, 4.33), and the series finale will feature Kevin Slowey (10-8, 3.78) and Ervin Santana (13-5, 3.39). Needless to say, we'll have our hands full with these guys, but it'll likely be the toughest test we face - outside of the White Sox series and the @Tampa Bay in September - the rest of the year.

Thought you should know that Matt Tolbert is now 1-for-6 in two rehab starts for New Britain, and is expected to rejoin the Twins when rosters expand on September 1... Last, I wanted to mention that Boof Bonser is looking much better lately. John Gordon talked about some increased velocity yesterday afternoon (hitting 95 mph), and that can only mean good things for our bullpen. He's boasting a 2.79 ERA, .250 BAA, 1.344 WHIP and 8.38 k/9 in eight August appearances.

That's enough for now...

Minor League Notes:

• 2B/3B Luke Hughes belted two hits, scored twice and stole his second base as a Rochester Red Wing last night. His batting totals (.284/.373/.540) have dropped a bit, but he's still looking good.
• Looking dominant, SP Anthony Swarzak moved to 4-0 with a 2.10 ERA/1.300 WHIP in five starts at the Triple-A level. Swarzak pitched one-run ball for six innings and struck out six batters while giving up just five hits. In addition, reliever Bobby Korecky now has nine straight scoreless innings, and racked up six saves and 9 Ks over that time period.
• Matthew Fox, a starter for Single-A Fort Myers, has been quite good over his past four starts (2-0, 1.14 ERA, 1.183 WHIP in 23 2/3 IP), including his most recent outing where he pitched seven shutout innings, striking out five.
• After getting blown up for eight earned runs in four innings on August 3, Beloit's Steven Hirschfield has been nearly untouchable. He's given up just three runs in the 21 subsequent innings, going 3-0 over that span.
• Elizabethton 1B Jonathan Waltenbury hadn't hit for much power lately, but rocketed two homers last night to bring his total to 10 on the season. He's currently on 10-game hitting streak that has his batting average back up to .329 on the year.

Thanks for reading, and have an awesome day!

Four steps forward, one step back

First thing's first - I'm going to do a live blog tomorrow during the day game since no one beside MLB.tv viewers and people in Oakland can see the broadcast. You can listen to it on the radio, but you'll be able to read my live, in-game comments right here at the Twins Hotspot! Feel free to add you own comments as well - there'll be an easy way to do it right here on the site. On to today's post...

Going into last night's game versus Oakland, I had a bad feeling. The Athletics baffled Twins hitters until the eighth inning, when Joe Mauer tripled in Denard Span and advanced to home plate on a throwing error. It was a disturbing night all around. The team finally got a solid outing from a starter - Blackburn went eight innings and gave up only three runs - and received a decent inning of pitching from Craig Breslow to close out Oakland. Unfortunately, as has rarely been the case of late, the bats failed to come through over and over, leaving 14 men on base (Morneau - 4 LOB).

More than anything, it was an annoying game. How often does everything come together, only to fall short at the last minute? It's a buzzkill, a momentum drainer. But let's take a look at some positives on this dreary Tuesday morning: 

1) Mauer busted out three hits last night, and now has an 11-game hitting streak. He's also batting .360/.443/.520 in the month of August with two homers and 10 RBI. Basically, he's on fire right now. What's more, Mauer is now second to New York's Xavier Nady for the Batting Average lead.

2) Denard Span has failed to hit safely in just two of his past 15 games, and has a current eight-game hitting streak. Span has three multi-hit games in his past four outings as well.

3) In the American League, the Twins offense ranks no. 6 in runs scored, no. 3 in batting average, no. 7 in on-base percentage, and in the bottom five of runners left on base. All very healthy totals.

4) Tonight's starter, Kevin Slowey, has a 2.36 ERA and 0.900 WHIP in his past four starts. 

I hope that helped you get over the loss... it certainly helped me. 

In other news, Twins infielder Matt Tolbert is expected to start a double-A rehab assignment today in New Britain. It's likely that he'll remain in the minors until rosters expand on September 1... Alexi Casilla played his first minor league game with Beloit last night and went 1-for-3 with a single, two walks and a failed stolen base attempt. Looks like he'll be ready to start in Anaheim this weekend... Adam Everett may be a candidate to hit the DL with a sore hand - it'd make room for Casilla, that's for sure... Delmon Young is day-to-day with a "jammed" ankle that he sustained in the fourth inning last night. He walked with a limp after the game, according to Joe Christensen of the Star Tribune.

Minor League Notes: 

• Rochester SP Phil Humber kept the great pitching going as he tossed eight innings last night, giving up just two runs on four hits whlie walking three. The Red Wing bats couldn't support him though, and he lost the decision. Still, Humber has a 2.97 ERA and 1.169 WHIP over the past 39 1/3 innings.
• Over at New Britain, David Winfree continues to tear the cover off the ball - he's got homers in three straight games, and now has a five game hitting streak with 10 RBI over that span. In addition, 3B Daniel Valencia (two games in a row) and OF Dustin Martin homered last night for the Rock Cats.

Poll Update: In our most recent poll, it seems that the majority of you believe Jesse Crain should be the Twins' new eighth-inning man... we'll see which way the management goes once September hits. My money is on Bobby Korecky from Rochester. 

Thanks for reading! Have a wonderful day! 

Three in a Row!

Win the 7-6 late-inning comeback win over Seattle yesterday afternoon, the Twins set themselves up to sweep the Mariners today as Glen Perkins faces Ryan Feierabend. What's even more impressive is that the team is now a season-high 16 games over .500, a mark they never hit in 2007 with the likes of Torii Hunter and Johan Santana gracing the field. It's been an exciting ride, and to be in the division hunt is something that we, as fans, should be thankful for after such a disheartening offseason. And the fact that we did all of this in spite of Livan Hernandez is all the more awe-inspiring.

What hasn't been inspiring of late, however, is Scott Baker. He came off the DL in June and absolutely baffled hitters, but in his past five starts - including yesterday - Baker has seemed to lose his sense of the strike zone and is allowing hits at an alarmingly high rate with a 1.674 WHIP (34 hits, 14 BB) and 5.96 ERA in 28 2/3 innings. Baker has failed to get into the sixth inning in three of those starts, so not only is he hurting the team, he's also taxing the bullpen whenever he starts. Baker throws again on Friday in Los Angeles as the team starts a massive 14-game road trip, and there'll be no better time this season (barring playoffs) for him to start pitching well again.

We got some good news about Alexi Casilla and Matt Tolbert this weekend - both could play with the team in the coming weeks. Casilla took grounders, threw and hit off a tee Friday night and pounded some soft toss Saturdsay and is vying to return to the Twins at some point during this next road trip. Probably near the end of the month. Tolbert, on the other hand, will probably be a September addition to the team... no word on when, exactly, that will happen. Update: Alexi Casilla will begin a rehab assignment Monday, and should be back with the Twins on Wednesday.

Sunday Twins Notes: With four straight multi-hit games in a row, Delmon Young continued to slowly march his batting average upward - he's at .294 now and hasn't cracked .300 yet... Joe Mauer is 4-for-9 with a home run and 3 RBI ... found out that the new stadium is going to ROCK ... After batting just .136 so far in August, Justin Morneau came through with two hits yesterday to break a three-game hitless streak ... Just when you thought it was safe to put Jesse Crain on the mound, he gives up two earned runs on a hit and a walk - we need to rely on Crain, but he's making it awfully difficult ... Dennys Reyes, however, hasn't allowed an earned run in his past 10 appearances (since July 27), and has a 0.546 WHIP, 8.1 K/9 IP and incredible .111 BAA over those 7 1/3 innings.

Minor League Notes:

• Rochester OF Jason Pridie went hitless on Friday to end his 20-game hitting streak. Pridie got the night off Saturday as well. In his stead, 2B/3B Luke Hughes belted his third homer of the year for the Red Wings, and continues to look quite comfortable at the Triple-A level.
  
• With two home runs in his past three games, New Britain's Daniel Valencia has nearly matched his power output from high-A Fort Myers in the first half of the season. His .275/.320/.412 hitting line as a Rock Cat is decidedly worse, however. Teammate David Winfree now has 17 home runs on the season and has bashed three in his past seven games (11-for-30, .367 BA, 9 RBI).
  
• 24-year-old SP Yohan Pino has a 13-game scoreless streak for New Britain, and has two straight wins over that span, including an eight-inning shutout performance on Friday night.
  
• Elizabethton center fielder Angel Morales has caught fire of late, slamming eight hits - four for home runs - in his past 14 at bats (four games) for a team-leading 15 homers and .329 batting average in the process. This kid is only 19 years old, so keep an eye on a possible quick rise through the organization.

Thanks for reading, and enjoy the noon game today... SWEEP!!!

Alexi Casilla/Pat Neshek Update

I don't usually post little things like this, but it's good news - turns out Alexi Casilla and Pat Neshek could be back THIS season!

Lavelle E. Neal wrote about Neshek today, saying the reliever is beginning a throwing program, and there's a possibility that he could pitch for the Twins in September. That'd be a major boost.

The other nugget - Casilla's status - was found on CBS.Sportsline.com. They're saying that Casilla could take batting practice in as few as two weeks, which would eventually give the infield an obvious bump in production for the stretch run.

That's all for now... enjoy the game tonight! It's Liriano day!