Don’t miss a word of Brandon Warne’s 2018 Minnesota Twins Guide.
- SEASON OVERVIEW
- 2017 PLAYER GRADES
- 2018 OPENING DAY ROSTER/LINEUP
- PROSPECT RANKINGS
- OLD FRIENDS
- SEASON PREDICTION
April – 12-11 (1.0 GB, 6.5 percent playoff odds via Fangraphs)
The Twins opened up the season at home with a three-game thumping of the Royals, and continued the good vibes into taking two of three against the White Sox on the road. Detroit and Chicago provided a bit of resistance, then Cleveland splashed cold water on any good vibes the Twins had with a sweep at Progressive Field, dropping Minnesota to 7-8 on the year.
The Twins rebounded with series wins over the Rangers and Royals at home to get back over .500 by the end of the month. The pitching had a 3.93 ERA in April (10th), with Ervin Santana (0.77 ERA), Brandon Kintzler (0.79) and Tyler Duffey (1.59) leading the way. Miguel Sano led the way for the offense, hitting .316/.443/.684 with seven home runs in 23 April games. No team walked more frequently than the Twins (11.6 percent) in April.
May – 14-12, 26-23 overall (0.0 GB, 11 percent)
This was another solid, stay-afloat month for a Twins team with a lot to prove. The big moments came on each end of the month, with Joe Mauer hitting the first walk-off home run of his career against Boston’s Matt Barnes on May 5, pushing the team’s record to 15-12. Again, another series provided proof that the Twins weren’t quite ready to be listed among the AL’s elite, however, as the Astros came into town and swept the Twins from May 29-31 by a collective 40-15 margin.
Game one of the series was especially ugly, as the Twins bullpen allowed an unthinkable 14 earned runs between the eighth and ninth innings in a 16-8 loss. Santana gave the Twins seven one-run innings before Ryan Pressly, Craig Breslow, Matt Belisle and Drew Rucinski combined for the carnage afterward. Houston capped the crushing with a 17-6 win on Wednesday afternoon, as Hector Santiago gave up six earned runs in as many innings while his bullpen — Duffey, Breslow, Jason Wheeler and Chris Gimenez (!) — combined to give up 10 earned runs over the next three frames. The Twins hit a collective .260/.337/.449 in May, with Joe Mauer leading the way as he hit .346/.442/.531. That offense had to carry a pitching staff that had a collective 5.29 ERA — a mark better than just one team (Philadelphia, 5.93). Santana (2.57) and Jose Berrios (2.70) were both solid, though ugly numbers were much easier to come by.
May Day, indeed.
June – 14-15, 40-38 overall (2.0 GB, 10.2 percent)
Another big sweep at the hands of the Indians threatened to waylay the progress made by the Twins midway through the month (June 16-18). That dropped the Twins to 34-33, but they returned the favor with a three-game sweep over the Indians starting three days later to push back to five games over .500 and a half-game up in first place. That jubilation was short-lived, however, as the Twins dropped four of five games to close out the month and six of eight to fall to 41-40 early in July.
The offense was stagnant in June, hitting a collective .243/.305/.400 for an 84 wRC+ that ranked 28th among the 30 MLB clubs. Eduardo Escobar hit .354/.398/.549 in 24 games — foreshadowing how he’d do replacing Sano, perhaps — while Eddie Rosario’s midseason surge also started. He hit .291/.341/.519 and popped five homers as well. The pitching staff also wasn’t particularly good, either, as they ranked 23rd in June with a 5.04 ERA. So in a sense, it was remarkable the Twins managed to stay afloat in June. Part of the reason is that much of the struggles were concentrated among pitchers who didn’t throw much in June, however. Seven pitchers had ERAs over 6.00 in June, and Santana (6.03) was the only one who threw more than 10 innings. The primary culprits? Randy Rosario (30.86 in 2.1 IP), Nik Turley (16.39 in 9.1 IP), Adam Wilk (16.20 in 3.1 IP), Santiago (13.50 in 4.2 IP) and Breslow (10.61 in 9.1 IP).
All told, that’s 49 earned runs in 28 innings if we subtract Santana and the two earned runs by Gimenez in three innings. That’s a 15.75 ERA from that crew, and a 3.71 mark from everyone else. That’s sort of a key theme for this pitching staff in 2017, and how they can improve in 2018 by cleaning up the ugly innings given to pitchers who have no business in the big leagues.
July – 10-15, 50-53 overall (6.5 GB, 4.0 percent)
This is where the wheels fell off. The beginning of the month wasn’t terrible, as the Twins opened with five wins in eight games. The trouble is that they went 5-12 the rest of the way in July, with crushing losses in three straight against the Dodgers and two of three to an A’s team that wasn’t particularly good. The final three losses of the month were of the walk-off variety — probably the most crushing you can have — and as a result, the Twins limped into the trade deadline with a 50-53 record. Fangraphs had them pegged with playoff odds of 5.3 percent, and those dropped to 3.9 percent on separate occasions later in the week. There’s little wonder that Falvey and Levine decided to ship out pieces at the deadline; no team had ever made the playoffs in the present two-team Wild Card era with odds that poor.
But the Twins became the first.
While the Twins were sputtering in July, Buxton was heating up with the weather. He hit an insane .387/.457/.516, though it was in just 10 games. Still, he posted 0.6 fWAR in that stretch. Over 162 games, that’s a pace of 9.7 WAR! Incredible. Overall, the Twins offense was just decent in July, hitting a collective .260/.343/.393 (96 wRC+). On the other hand, the pitching staff…..it was not good. They posted a 5.20 ERA, with nine pitchers posting ERA marks of 5.50 or worse. Matt Belisle was terrific, as he was unscored upon in 12.1 innings in the month, and Adalberto Mejia put together a decent July as well (3.49 ERA). Otherwise, it wasn’t pretty.
August – 20-10, 70-63 overall (6.5 GB, 41.9 percent)
That’s the great thing about wheels — most of the time, you can just put them back on. Also, how insane is it that the Twins went 10 games over .500 in August and didn’t gain ground? You can thank the ridiculous 22-game winning streak by Cleveland for that one. That’s more than three weeks without losing. Insane.
The Twins alternated wins and losses to open the month, then went on a blistering stretch where they won six games in a row and seven of eight, with a walk-off loss in Detroit being the only setback. The Twins continued rolling afterward, steamrolling NL Wild Card team Arizona in three straight games at Target Field, and closed the month with a four-game winning streak over the White Sox. The Twins went from broke (sub-5.0 percent playoff odds to start the month) to woke (48.4 percent on Aug. 31) over the span of a month, though they still needed a pretty good finish to get where they were headed.
Jorge Polanco (.373/.413/.686) was absolutely unconscious in August, while Buxton (.324/.354/.619) continued his summer sizzle as well. Overall, it was a terrific offensive month for the Twins, who hit a collective .280/.351/.498 — or nearly the full-season equivalent of a Dozier (.271/.359/.498).
Santana found his early-season ways and then some, posting a 2.95 ERA with more than a strikeout per inning, while Trevor Hildenberger (2.19 ERA), Alan Busenitz (1.32) and Ryan Pressly (1.13) locked things down out in the bullpen. The pitching staff as a whole was terrific in August, posting a 3.78 ERA (seventh in MLB) with 8.4 K/9.
September/October – 15-14, 85-77 overall (17 GB, 100 percent)
September led to a strange battle of attrition for the final Wild Card spot, as the teams around the Twins all wilted while they more or less stayed the course. The Twins did benefit from a Detroit team that was deep in the tank in September, as six of those 15 wins came against a Tigers team that went just 6-24 from Sept. 1 on. That’s right. The Twins had six wins (6-1) against the Tigers from Sept. 1 on, and the Tigers had six wins against everyone in that stretch (6-24).
Not bad. Well, unless you’re Brad Ausmus.
Anyway, the Twins were pretty fortunate with how the end of their schedule went. Their wins in September came against the Rays, Royals, Padres, Blue Jays and Tigers — teams that finished a collective 68 games under .500 in 2017.
Maybe we shouldn’t be surprised the Twins were stomped in the Bronx? But anything can happen when it’s “One Night Only.”
Dozier was terrific down the stretch for the Twins, hitting .324/.410/.588 over the last month — a .164 wRC+. It was another strong month offensively for the club, which finished sixth with a 110 wRC+ (.269/.337/.468). As we’ve said before, they finished fourth in runs scored and are bringing back most of the offense in 2018, so they should be able to score. Even against weaker competition, however, the pitching staff returned to its mediocre ways, posting a 4.39 ERA. Taylor Rogers was unscored upon in 7.2 innings, and Kyle Gibson (3.28 ERA) carried the water for the starters with six solid starts.
Check out the rest of Brandon Warne’s 2018 Minnesota Twins Guide.
- SEASON OVERVIEW
- 2017 PLAYER GRADES
- 2018 OPENING DAY ROSTER/LINEUP
- PROSPECT RANKINGS
- OLD FRIENDS
- SEASON PREDICTION
