For three innings, the Minnesota Twins and Seattle Mariners were locked in a scoreless duel where the offenses mirrored the air temperature. That didn’t last, as the Mariners scored 11 runs over the final six innings off Jose Berrios and a cadre of Twins relievers as the team had its first real clunker seven games into the season in an 11-4 loss at Target Field on a bitterly cold Saturday.
LISTEN: Paul Molitor’s postgame presser
After giving up five runs combined in innings four and five, the Twins clawed back to within 5-3 before allowing a five-spot in the eighth as the rout was on. Near the end, manager Paul Molitor emptied his bench, both at the plate as well as getting Rule 5 reliever Tyler Kinley into his first MLB game.
Here’s what we saw from our reference point:
Molitor got the hardware for his AL Manager of the Year Award before the game
Molitor very likes to avoid talking about himself, and he said before the game that he still feels the same about the award as he did last fall when it was handed out. “It’s a very nice award,” Molitor conceded. “But my thoughts on it haven’t changed much from when it was announced. For any manager to be in that conversation. …a lot of other people had to do their jobs really well.”
Molitor’s stance softened a bit after the game, most likely because the award was handed out to him by former Twins manager Tom Kelly — an honor Molitor was not aware of ahead of time. “When I saw him early this morning, I thought he might be doing some TV or something,” Molitor said after the game. “But he kind of kept it under wraps. It means a lot coming from him, obviously.”
Molitor played for Kelly from 1996-98 before retiring following a storied 21-year career.
It was the coldest game in team history — for both teams
The game-time temperature was 27 degrees, well below the previous low of 31 back on April 17, 2014. How cold was it? To start the game, both teams agreed — and ran it by the commissioner’s office before the game, Molitor added — to let relievers warm up inside in the batting cages rather than the bullpen. Molitor wagered that the shade of the bullpen made it 10-15 degrees colder than the air temperature, and the agreement included the team calling up to the press box to say who was warming. The press box would then, in turn, call the visiting dugout to make sure bullpen moves were made with transparency.
Molitor admitted after the game he wasn’t totally sure where to point when he called for his first reliever, though the Twins ultimately populated their bullpen later in the game when the sun peaked out a bit more. The Mariners stayed indoors all game.
Berrios was terrific the first time through the order, dismal the second time
A sleeveless Berrios set down the first 10 batters in order with a mix of a tremendous fastball with a hard, biting curve before running into trouble the second time around. Berrios was as high as 94.7 mph with his fastball early and the curve looked good, but after holding the Mariners 0-for-9 the first time through the order, Seattle bit back with a 5-for-9 stretch the second time around.
It may be a chicken/egg scenario, but a Miguel Sano error set off Berrios’ struggles
The Mariners pushed across three earned runs in the fourth, but it started innocently enough. Dee Gordon lifted a popup to Eduardo Escobar at short, then Jean Segura hit a slow roller that Sano should have put in his back pocket. Instead, he fired wildly to first, allowing Segura to pick up second. Three pitches later, Robinson Cano stroked an RBI single, and two batters later, Kyle Seager roped a 3-1 fastball off the foul pole in right for a 3-0 lead.
It’s certainly not the reason that Berrios began to struggle, but it just happened to coincide with the first baserunner he allowed — which was the Segura slow roller.
A couple of low-probability plays loomed large in the game
The Mariners pushed the lead to 5-0 with a two-run single from Gordon in the fifth inning. Ichiro Suzuki went the other way for a single with one out, and moved to third on a double by Mike Marjama. The Twins brought the infield in, and Gordon’s soft grounder bled through the infield to bring home Suzuki and Marjama. Gordon’s exit velocity was just 62.5 percent on the grounder, with a hit probability of 11 percent. An infield back prevents the second run from scoring on that play, but there’s no way to be certain it might not have eventually scored, and even still, the Twins didn’t score their fourth run until the ninth inning — when they were down by eight runs.
Joe Mauer and Sano poked a pair of doubles into left field to begin the rally for the Twins in the bottom of the sixth. Those doubles chased Mike Leake, and the one from Sano drew a loud groan from Mariners writers openly lamenting that Suzuki should have caught it. For what it’s worth, Suzuki was later replaced by Guillermo Heredia — who ran the left field foul pole for a homer of his own later off Trevor Hildenberger — and the hit probability on Sano’s double was a mere 39 percent.
Gabriel Moya would have probably gotten more credit if the game had stayed closer
The only real damage Moya incurred was a walk to Cano when he first came in, and frankly, he got him to a full count with first base open, then threw him a 3-2 slider that just missed down and away. In other words, he decided he’d rather have Mitch Haniger beat him than Cano, and he got the right fielder to lift a 2-2 fastball to Mauer in foul territory to end the inning. Moya came back out for the sixth, and quickly mowed down Seager, Dan Vogelbach and Ryon Healy before the Twins went to work in the sixth.
Sano had a wild day at the plate
The box score just says 1-for-2 with three walks, but Sano saw a staggering 32 pitches. In early-season action, he’s looked solid at the plate. He’s still striking out plenty — a terrifying 43.8 percent through Saturday’s action — but he’s also hitting .296/.406/.741 with three homers.
Kinley’s inning was…..a mixed bag
Segura opened the inning with a double that was deflected off the glove of Escobar making a dive at short, but when Eddie Rosario came in to make a play on the ball with a quick flip to try catch him at second, the ball wound up going….into shallow center, allowing Segura to pick up third. It was a play far too reminiscent of the 2016 season, and one that was just wholly unnecessary given the deficit (10-3) and juncture of the game (top of the ninth). Nonetheless, Kinley threw a wild pitch to Haniger which allowed Segura to score, but got Andrew Romine on a swinging strikeout, Seager on a grounder to Mauer and Taylor Motter to fan looking.
Kinley also didn’t cover first on the grounder to Mauer, which was kicked into foul territory. When Mauer picked it up, he lifted his head to find Kinley near the bag — only to see the rookie standing on the mound instead of near first. Mauer recovered with ample time to get the out, but there’ll likely be a kangaroo court fine for that one. Kinley was as high as 96.9 mph on his four-seamer, and spun a pair of high-80s sliders that got Motter looking which looked pretty nasty. There’s enough talent here, but the command/execution will be the difference.
Ryan LaMarre keeps raking
LaMarre stepped up to hit for Mauer in the ninth, and ripped the first pitch he saw into left field off Mariners reliever James Pazos. LaMarre is now 4-for-6 in his brief time with the Twins — quite a turnaround from the 3-for-37 stretch he came into the year on.
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Up next: LHP Marco Gonzales (4.26 ERA/6.46 FIP in 6.1 IP) vs. RHP Lance Lynn (11.25 ERA/9.24 FIP in 4.0 IP), Sunday, 1:10 p.m.
Listen to Brandon on Midwest Swing & Locked On Twins
