First, I want to say that Rondell White is a quality hitter and his batting average won’t stay at .085 for long. That being said, Rondell White should not be the cleanup hitter on this team. The first two weeks have been played and I can’t count how many runners White has left out on base. Stewart, Castillo and Mauer have all been very good at the top of the lineup and numerous runs could’ve been scored if Rondell White had played only half as horrendous as he actually did. I don’t think there’s a team in baseball that has a guy intentionally walked to get to the cleanup hitter (especially twice in 1 game).

Unfortunately, the Twins don’t have a true cleanup hitter. Morneau and Hunter were tried at the cleanup spot last year with little success, and Gardenhire has made it clear that he doesn’t want to go that route. Morneau is the Twins most powerful hitter and probably best built to fill that spot in the lineup, but he didn’t fair well there last season, and he’s been pretty successfull out of the 6-spot this season. It sounds like White won’t be batting cleanup on Tuesday against the Angels, so what will the Twins do with him? Here are a couple possibilities.

• Move Morneau or Batista to the cleanup spot and bat White 6th or 7th. This would get White out of the important spot in the lineup and take some pressure off him. I like this move because I think Morneau needs to learn how to be the #4 hitter on this team. I’m not sure if this decision would be popular with Gardenhire though. Batista has the power, but he’s just not a good enough hitter to bat cleanup.
• Bench White on Tuesday night and play Ruben Sierra at DH. Sierra has been called up and will debut for the Twins Tuesday agains the Angels. It’s been mentioned that he could platoon in right field, but why do that when we already have 2 players (Cuddyer and Ford) fighting for playing time there. Give Sierra some at bats at DH until White can get out of this funk.

Long-term I think it’d be great if Morneau could step into the cleanup spot and be successful. If not, we’ll just have to make due until White gets his bat going and can be put back into the 4th spot in the lineup.