One of the more memorable moments from the 2006 season was the game in late June in which Francisco Liriano faced off against Roger Clemens in his season debut for the Houston Astros. Liriano stole the spotlight from Clemens as he allowed just 2 runs through 8 innings on his way to his seventh win of the season.

Monday night’s game against Clemens was just another reminder that this year isn’t like last year. Obviously there’s no Liriano, but the Twins also aren’t in the midst of hot streak. They continue to float around the .500 mark and they gave the Rocket his best start since joining the Yankees about a month ago.

Clemens held the Twins to just 1 run on 2 hits through 8 innings as the Twins lost 5-1. In the past two games the Twins have made it known to National ESPN audiences just how terrible their offense can be. They’ve managed just 1 run in the past two games.

Game Notes

• Joe Mauer had 2 of the Twins’ 4 hits including 1 double.
• Torii Hunter is now 0-25 in his career against Clemens after going 0 for 3 at the plate.
• Matt Garza saw his first big league action of the season. He pitched 2 scoreless innings to end the game. He allowed 2 hits and struck out 1.
• Luis Castillo was not charged with an error, but he had a poor night in the field. He failed to turn what would’ve been an inning ending double play in the 2nd when he couldn’t get the ball out of his glove and then he made a high throw that forced Morneau to jump and bump into Alex Rodriguez. A-rod left the game with a leg injury.

The halfway point

The Twins are now 81 games through the 162 game season and they site just a few games over .500 at 42-39. They now trail Cleveland by a more troubling 7.5 games and they’re looking more and more like a .500 3rd place team every day. Last season they were 46-35 at the halfway point and although they trailed by 9 games, they were playing much better baseball.

Morneau in HR derby

Justin Morneau said that he will participate in the HR derby next week. The last record I can find of a Twins’ player participating in the contest was in 1989 when Gary Gaetti belted 0 home runs in Anaheim Stadium. The last Twin to actually hit a long ball in the HR derby was Tom Brunansky in the inaugural derby of 1985 which happened to take place in the Metrodome.

I don’t like the derby all that much, but it’ll be fun to see Morneau in it.

Tuesday’s matchup

Carlos Silva (6-8, 4.15) vs. Chien-Ming Wang (7-4, 3.86). Silva has been doing his best see-saw impersonation as of late (he’s due for a good one this time around) and Wang is coming off a couple rough outings.