Carl Crawford Topic Page

This was a game I only saw bits and pieces of, and I missed the 9th and 10th innings, so I'll definitely have to go back and watch the archived game from MLB.tv.

The Twins and D-rays split a 4-game set in their first meeting at the Metrodome early in the year. The Twins were lucky to escape with one of the wins as they relied on a top of the ninth inning brain cramp from Carl Crawford and bottom of the ninth walk-off from Justin Morneau to escape with a 3-2 victory.

There's no doubt that the Twins are sitting in a much better decision right now than they were as April closed last year. They finished off April with a 14-11 record compared to last year's 9-15 and they sit just 1.5 games behind the division leading Indians rather than trailing the White Sox by 8.0 games. That's not to say they exceeded expectations. Most people, including myself, expect the Twins to be a winning team this season and the April record puts them on pace to win about 91 games.

It was, for the most part, a disappointing series for the Twins against a team that they should be able to defeat easily. Not only did they lose on Friday night with ace Johan Santana on the mound, but Joe Nathan took the loss in the ninth inning on Sunday. With the exception of Saturday night, the Twins bats were weak all series long largely due to the ineffectiveness of the "piranhas".

In 2005 Johan Santana started off the season with 3 straight victories. He was poised to do it again, but one bad inning and the lack of offensive support sent the Twins and Johan to a loss against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The Twins could muster only 2 runs against the tough lefty, Scott Kazmir.

Thursday night's game against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays was a low scoring affair that didn't feature many highlights until the ninth inning. Carlos Silva looked like his old self again. He gave up a lot of hits, but they were scattered and he left a lot of runners on base. He nearly gave up a homerun in the third inning, but it was caught by Jason Kubel right against the wall. Other than that he got a good mix of ground balls and managed to go 6 2/3 innings without allowing a run.

The Tampa Bay Devil Rays will come to the Metrodome for a four game series beginning on Thursday. They've lost 4 of their last five games, but are coming off a 6-5 victory against the Rangers on Wednesday night. They split their opening series with the Yankees last week. The D-rays are known as the perennial cellar-dwellers of the AL Eeast, but they might be starting to build up a better team (though they're not there yet).