Raul Ibanez Topic Page

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.

Seattle held a narrow 1-run lead against Johan Santana and the Twins for most of this game, but the Twins were able to put together a big inning in the seventh and hold off a ninth inning charge from the Mariners to win the game and sweep the 3 game series. The Mariners scored first when Ichiro reached on a Jason Bartlett throwing error. Ichiro was thrown caught in a run-down later in the inning between third and home, but it allowed Jose Vidro to move to second and be driven in by a Raul Ibanez single.

Before the game it was safe to assume that it would be a high scoring affair with two not so great pitchers, Jeff Weaver and Ramon Ortiz, faced off against each other. Ortiz got through the game without much damage, but Weaver was absolutely terrible. Weaver actually cut his 31.50 ERA in half with the 7 runs in 6 innings, but a 15.75 ERA still sucks.

The Twins will start off a 6-game road trip with a stop out west to face the Seattle Mariners. The Mariners literally got off to a slow start this season when they were forced to sit around in Cleveland for an entire weekend as games got postponed. None of the four games were able to be played. They were also postponed on Thursday in Boston. When they've been able to play they've been up and down. The Mariners have lost by lopsided scores such as 9-0 and 14-3 and they've recently had lopsided victories against Texas (8-3 and 14-3).