One day after complaining that the 2012 edition of the Minnesota Twins was a noncompetitive baseball team, they put together their best performance of the season and looked every bit the competitive team that fans thought they would be this year.
Newcomer Scott Diamond, who had been shining (I’ll try to avoid Diamond puns as best I can) in AAA this season carried over his momentum to the majors. He put together a strong 7 inning outing, holding the Angels scoreless while striking out 6.
It was the first time this season that the Twins pitching staff held their opponents scoreless. 29 games and that was the first shutout. Yeah, it’s been a long year.
The most impressive aspect of Diamond’s efforts last night was his ability to work out of jams. The early innings saw Diamond in situations that have bitten Twins starters earlier this year (Leadoff singles, early inning walks) Diamond was able to work his way out of each jam, getting Pujols to groundout or Hunter to strikeout.
It’s obviously way too early to declare Diamond a success, but if he can even remotely duplicate last night’s performance on a consistent basis the Twins pitching staff might have its first reliable pitcher.
Not to be outdone, the offense decided to show up last night as well. Brian Dozier proved his call up was a good decision by going 3 for 4 and showing great defensive range. Josh Willingham had a clutch 2 out hit in the first that gave the Twins and early lead and Ryan Doumit promptly tripled said lead with a 2 run home run.
The Twins had the bases loaded twice in last night’s game and failed to get in any runners. This is still an issue for this team, one that will cause them to lose some games (it already has) but if they’re remotely able to get at least some of those clutch hits across, they’re going to start picking up wins they’ve been otherwise leaving behind.
A New Trend:
I don’t want to scare it away, but a new trend has been developing over the past few games. The Twins pitching staff has actually been keeping the team in games. Ranging back to Pavano’s last start against the Mariners, each Twins’ starter has performed admirably, managing to keep the game within range.
Granted, the offense decided to take a week off, rendering these great starts meaningless – but a trend is a trend, even if the results aren’t backing it up all the time.
If (big if) the Twins can get better pitching from their starters, and (big and) their offense can continue to string together some clutch hits like they did in the early season – this team will start to win games.
Are they division contenders? Most likely not, however, stranger things have happened. At the very least, string a couple of wins together in a weak division and hang around. You never know how things will develop as the season progresses.
Pavano takes the mound tonight with a chance to win a series for the Twins for the first time since…well, since they did so against the Angels in Minnesota…a month ago. (You remember? The second series of the season?…Yeah, it’s been awhile). That series is followed by a 4 game set with a scrappy Blue Jay team and a short 2 game series with the division leading Indians.
It’s only one win and they’re still 13 games below .500, but last night’s win might (might) be one of those momentum builders. We can hope, right?
Go Twins!
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