Youth Movement

Late last night, while the Twins were in the process of being held to 1 hit by Felix Hernandez and the Mariners, it was announced that Scott Diamond and Brian Dozier were being called up from AAA Rochester. All I can say to this announcement is "Finally". This team is clearly not a contending club - any thoughts or dreams of them being "in the hunt" in this division were clearly misplaced. As such, why not call up some of the young guys and give them a shot?

On his radio show this morning, Ron Gardenhire said that Dozier will be his everyday starting shortstop and that he'll move other players around as he sees fit. Essentially, that means Carroll will likely get a few days off and then platoon at 2B with Casilla. Likewise, Casilla will probably earn some time off with this move and then play a little 3B to let Danny Valencia have a day or two off.

I've been calling for these moves for almost a week now and it's nice to see the team decide to bring up some of the young players who have been playing well in Rochester. Hopefully, Dozier can come in and hit at or around the .270 he had been batting in AAA. Diamond, who was simply lights out in AAA, will hopefully bring a little more consistency to the 'pen.

A corresponding move for calling up Diamond has not been made, but it's likely that either Jeff Gray or Matt Maloney will be DFA or that Liam Hendriks will simply be sent down to AAA. Dozier corresponding move was to place Justin Morneau on the 15 day DL with a wrist injury. We haven't heard if this injury is in fact worse than was originally reported or if they're simply giving Morneau more time to heal.

Pitching Improvements: 

Over the past few games, the Twins' starting pitchers have finally been able to keep the game under control. Carl Pavano, Jason Marquis and Nick Blackburn have all been able to make good starts, limiting their opponents to a few runs. (Pavano gave up two, Marquis gave up two and Blackburn gave up three. Even Liriano, who was largely ineffective last week, 'only' gave up four.)

Offensive Letdowns 

Unfortunately, this sudden pitching epiphany has come with a complete offensive shutdown. The Twins have been held scoreless in 3 of their last 4 games and have only mustered 9 hits in those 4 games. Not good...

One could argue that facing CJ Wilson, Jared Weaver and Felix Hernandez could be the cause of this sudden offensive disappearance (I tend to lean that way) but it is concerning to see the one part of this team that was consistently effective suddenly grow cold. We'll see over the next few games if this is simply due to amazing pitchers or if the offensive surge early in the year was just a fluke.