Minnesota Twins Topic Page

The Twins beat the Boston Red Sox for their 6th win in the last 7 games. The win brought the Twins back to .500 with a 24-24 record, and pulled them ahead of Kansas City in the standings. They still trail the Detroit Tigers by 3.5 games.

Kevin Slowey earned his 7th win of the season. Only Zack Greinke and Roy Halladay have more than 7 wins. Slowey probably hasn't been the best pitcher on the team, but he's been good enough and gotten plenty of run support when he needed it.

Compared to last season, not a lot changed for the Twins this past winter. Last offseason saw the loss of Johan Santana and Torii Hunter as well as a trade that sent Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett to the Tampa Bay Rays for Delmon Young and Brendan Harris. This offseason's biggest move was the signing of Joe Crede, who comes into the season still trying to shake off any doubt about his health.

Let's take a position-by-position look at where the Twins stand in 2009 compared to 2008.

What did it take to bring me back from my stint of inactivity? First, I finally have internet hooked up at home again after recently moving, but most importantly Terry Ryan has dropped a bit of a surprise by deciding to step down as General Manager of the Minnesota Twins.

After Saturday night's 13 inning game that completely exhausted the Twins bullpen, the Twins needed Carlos Silva to come up with a good start and to go deep into the game. He did both. He lasted into the eighth before giving up his second run of the game and being pulled in favor of Juan Rincon. After allowing a run in the second inning he was pretty much on auto-pilot the rest of the way. After a few rough starts, Silva's return to form couldn't have come at a better time.

What's most surprising about the Twins being in the playoff hunt after their slumpy start? Is it how well the Twins have played or is it how poorly Chicago and Detroit have played?

Johan Santana is always a great pitcher, but in big games he somehow manages to step it up a notch. He was virtually unhittable on Sunday against the Tigers as he led the Twins to a series victory over the flailing Tigers. Pitch count knocked Santana out of the game in the seventh. Before leaving he allowed just four baserunners and struck out 11.

The last two nights have been perfect indications that the playoff race is heating up. Two of the most exciting games of the season came back to back, and best of all, the Twins won both. The Twins jumped out to an early lead against Jose Contreras, scoring five runs in the first three innings and knocking Contreras out of the game after 2 2/3 innings. Santana wasn't as dominate as he usually is, but he managed to get through 7 innings allowing just three runs (two earned) and it looked like everything was going well—the Twins were cruising to victory and the bullpen was going to get some rest. Then things got interesting.

The Twins got off to a slow start on Monday night in Chicago. Despite having baserunners in scoring position in the 3rd and 4th innings, Javier Vasquez managed to hold the Twins scoreless through five innings. In the meantime Brad Radke had given up a homerun in each of the 4th and 5th innings. However, they were both solo homers, so the damage was minimal. The Twins matched the White Sox in power on Monday night; the difference was the Twins had more baserunners on when the balls left the park.

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:

The Twins hoped to put a miserable weekend of baseball behind them as they returned to the dome for a 7 game series starting with the Seattle Mariners. Unfortunately, the weekend horror story spilled over into Monday as the Twins lost by a pretty wide gap. Monday was just another day for the Twins -- another 19 hits and 8 runs surrendered. They did manage to score more runs than they manged all weekend in Detroit, but 2 runs isn't exactly what I'd call a major league offense.