Week 9 comprised of the first 7 games of a 10 game road trip out West for the Twins. The week, as a whole, can best be described as underachieving. Ron Gardenhire himself had the following to say in his Sunday morning interview with Sid Hartman:

“It’s frustrating. Honestly, we should be 4-2 on this trip and we’re 2-4”

Brad Radke, who turned in two pretty good starts in the week was hurt by errors and poor offense in both of his starts. The Twins pitching certainly improved over the week, but their offense was missing. Now let’s get onto the players that made a positive difference for the Twins last week.

Honorable Mention

• Brad Radke: As mentioned, Radke turned in two pretty good starts but had victories robbed from him on both outings due to defensive errors and offensive ineptitude. On Monday Radke gave up 2 runs through 6 innings and left the game with a 1 run lead before the errors by Castillo and Crain gave up the game in extra innings. On Saturday Radke entered the bottom of the 7th with a 1-run tie when a missed fly ball by Justin Morneau set up a scoring opportunity for Oakland. The A’s won the game 2-1.
• Francisco Liriano: After losing the first two games of the series against the Angels Liriano came on with a strong outing. He had a no-hitter going through 5 1/3 innings before a missed call gave up his first hit. Liriano left the game after 6 innings having given up just the 1 hit and no runs. The Twins went on to win the game 7-1 after adding 3 runs in the 9th.
• Justin Morneau: Morneau wasn’t spectacular, but he did pick up 6 hits through the week and got the big 2-run homer in the 8th inning against Oakland on Friday night to win the game 2-1. He did hurt the team with his missed fly ball on Saturday, but considering what the rest of the team did all week, Morneau deserves honorable mention.

Player of the Week: Joe Mauer

In a week of bad play for the Twins, Joe Mauer gave us something to watch with excitement and something to be proud of. All week long he spent time neck and neck with Alex Rios for the ML lead in batting average. Sure, the season isn’t even half over yet, and a lot could change, but it’s excited to again have a legitimate batting title contender on the Minnesota Twins, especially a guy that figures to get even better in the future.

Last week Mauer picked up 11 hits, 3 doubles and a homerun. On the season he has a .411 OBP and a .500 slugging percentage. He may not be leading the catchers in All-Star voting, but everyone who’s tracked baseball at all this season knows that he deserves to be the starting catcher in the mid-summer classic.