Notebook Dump (07.09.08)

Score: Twinks 5, Red Sux 6

Box Score

Record: 50-40, 2nd place, 2.5 back

Streak: 2 losses

The Quote: "I was trying to go away. I think sometimes, when you get in big situations, you overthrow a little bit, and the ball may do something different than you want it to. The ball kind of ran back in and up. It's the one place you don't want to go." - Matt Guerrier

The Inning: Guerrier. Manny. Anything else would be just lip service with statistics.

The Links:

(*) Today's afternoon game B-R.com preview: Livan "Fenway With A Win" Hernandez versus Josh Beckett. Hernandez has not fared well in Fenway according to his small sampling. In his two starts he has gone only 8 innings with a 12.38 era. His most recent was in 2006, Hernandez was tagged for 6 runs in 1.2 innings. The Twins, meanwhile, are 13-14 in day games this season.

(*) Let the rumors begin. For the record, I am in complete favor of Adrian Beltre who, if acquired, would still be available to the Twins for the 2009 for the reasonable price of $12-million for a right-handed power-hitting, solid glove third baseman (contingent on how many of the organization's prospects are involved). An entity that has elluded the Twins who have not been able to purchase or develop internally. According to the Fielding Bible Plus/Minus, Beltre is currently the third best defensive third baseman behind Scott Rolan and Troy Glaus with a plus/minus of +14 in addition to that, he has been smacking left-handed pitching around, batting .371/.482/.586 with 4 home runs in 85 plate appearances.

Notebook Dump (07.08.08)

Game: Twinks 0, Red Sux 1

Box Score

Record: 50-39, 2^nd place, 1.5 games back

Streak: 1 loss

The Quote: “Boy, he located well. We had him on the ropes that one inning and we didn't get anything." – Terry Francona, Red Sox Manager

The Rant: Seven seemed to be the magic number for last night’s game in Boston, appropriately enough, on the seventh day of the seventh month. Scott Baker tossed seven scoreless innings while racking up seven strikeouts along the way. The Red Sox, meanwhile, had seven hits against the Twins pitching staff (five off of Baker, two off of Brian Bass). In the first inning, both Joe Mauer (number 7) and Jason Kubel (not number 7) coaxed seven-pitch walks from Dice-K. But the most monumental statistic provided by the prime number in last night’s game: seven left on base by Delmon Young.

Yes, the correlation between the game and the number seven is statistical gibberish. Nevertheless, the seven runners left on base was a huge blow to the Twins chances of winning and Young’s continued youthful impatience was a big part of the reason why seven Twins vacated their respected bases for the dugout following his at-bat. As Joe Christensen pointed out, Matsuzaka had thrown 24-pitches to the previous five batters in the first inning (including the aforementioned walks to Mauer and Kubel). Yet Young did not retain any of this when his turn came. Instead, Young clubbed at the first offering by Matsuzaka, tapping it back to the mound with the bases loaded. Armed with the knowledge that a) Matsuzaka has labored to throw strikes historically this season and b) he is currently laboring to throw strikes in this very inning, Delmon Young should have been more selective.

"I was sitting dead-red fastball," Young said after the game. "That was a little bit up, and it got a little bit in. If it caught a little more of the bat, it would have been back up the middle. You've just got to tip your cap because he got out of the inning. It doesn't matter how you do it." Revisiting the TiVo recording and GameDay’s pitch f/x account, claiming that the pitch was “a little bit up” and “a little bit in” is like saying Tony Montana took "a few bullets" in the final scene of Scarface. It was up. It was in. "We've got a few guys who don't work the counts -- we swing," Ron Gardenhire said summarizing what should be the accepted sentiments exactly, "You take the good with the bad. ... We've been winning a lot of baseball games that way. [Young's] been getting a lot of hits that way."

Make no mistake about it Delmon Young has been one of the integral parts of the Twins resurgence, hitting .341/.372/.524 since June 6^th. In his Around the Majors blog, Christensen highlights that Young has been hitting .301 first pitch balls put in play so it is no secret that Young likes to take a swat at the first offering. So it isn't like it was a huge shock to see Young taking aim at the first pitch.

Typically this one of those games which I would vent about Gardenhire's mismanagement of the bullpen (similar to this). A move was necessary. Baker was at 94 pitches when the 7th inning ended and there was several well hit balls including Coco Crisp's flyball to right that Denard Span tracked down. Statistically, he gets hit hard from pitch 76 to pitch 100 (facing 298 batters, opponents had hit .329/.362/.529 off of him). The Red Sox, with Pedroia, Drew and Ramirez coming up were no punch-and-judy line-up. The eighth inning was just the spot to remove Baker. Guerrier was unavailable for the game since he pitched last night. Crain had given up four hits (two doubles) in his previous two outings, Gardenhire's confidence had obviously waned on Crain since his June 30th appearance against Detroit in which he failed to record an out. Throw in one of the two lefties? In Fenway? Yikes. That Green Monster is damn close with two righties scheduled to hit. Bass isn't exactly lights out but he had been doing well in recent times (.205/.222/.227 against past 45 batters with 2 runs allowed) but nothing screams out that Bass is ill-prepared to handle the heart of the Red Sox order. The Twins had also recently insinuated that Bass had earned the opportunity to pitch in higher-leverage situations. Good place to start.

Let's agree to call this one "one of those games" and get by it. Offense left a boat-load of runners on base. Bullpen faltered, sure. Sign of the apocalypse? No. It is unfortunate that the offense could not scrap together a run to support Baker’s outing (72 Game Score) especially when the opportunities presented themselves. This outing reaffirms that the Twins are positioned very well in the starting rotation and the lack of offensive output with runners in scoring position in last night's game is a prime example of what Aaron Gleeman was preaching.

The Links:

(*) Tonight's B-R.com game preview: Blackburn versus Jon Lester.

(*) Joey-Jo Jo Junior Shabado is the toughest out in the Majors according to Saberscoutings interesting PTO% statistic ("Pitchest Toward Outs"). USS Mariner's Dave Cameron has Joe listed as having the 15th highest current trade value. Here is the rest of Top 50 according to USS Mariner.

(*) The Star Tribune is reporting that the Twins are not looking to trade this deadline. "You're always looking to make your team better, and we'll continue to do that," Twins General Manager Bill Smith said before Monday's game against the Red Sox. "At the same time, you don't want to tinker too much with something that's not broken." Meanwhile on the left coast, the Padres General Manager Paul Depodesta is asking the fans to concoct a plan of attack for the Friars as the trade deadline approaches.

(*) Being born in 1981 (hence, circa 1981 in my moniker) I have little micro-introspection of the early 1980's Twins history - just the macro-stuff. The story of the Tiger's Dave Rozema failed attempt to execute a flying karate kick the Twins' John Castillo in a May 14th, 1982 bench-clearing brawl only to result in a season-ending tore ligament in his knee after he whiffed on Castillo was one that I was not familiar with. The West Michigan Whitecaps, in honor of Rozema, are hosting a bobblehead night with him in the standard Karate Kid position.

(*) Judd Spicer interviews Baseball-Reference founder Sean Foreman.

New and Improved: A Dissection of Lyle Kohse

This past offseason, Kyle Lohse shared a lot in common with 7.7 million other Americans across the country: he was unemployed and couldn't get a job.

Like an unwanted vagabond, Lohse and his agent knocked on doors of front offices only to find that there was no need for a career back-of-the-rotation starter seeking a 3-year, $24-million dollar deal. After the Seattle Mariners locked up Carlos Silva to the tune of 4-years and $48 million dollars in December, the contract request from Lohse appeared quite reasonable. After all, Silva, who was only a few months younger than Lohse, carried with him the same kind of pedigree. Silva was 54-46 (.540 wpct) in his six seasons of pitching while Lohse was slightly less victorious in his seven seasons in the majors with a 63-74 record (.459 wpct). Still, the phone did not ring. Up until January, the New York Mets flirted with the idea of Lohse being Plan B if they did not land Johan Santana. Alas, Mets GM Omar Minaya was able to package together a group of prospects enticing enough for newly-anointed Twins GM Bill Smith to swap the left-handed Cy Young winner in exchange. "Some teams said they were going to do some things, and they never materialized,'' Lohse said. "I know a lot of people talked about how I turned this and that down. I'm not going to get into what was really going on, but I think a lot of people heard a lot of rumors and assumed they were true.''

As pitchers and catchers report date past for Kyle Lohse without a contract, Lohse must have felt about as desirable as frostbitten teabags. Instead of wallowing in unsigned pitcher self-pity, Lohse took to honing his craft against NCAA opponents, pitching against Cal-State Irvine and Cal-State Fullerton and the dreaded aluminum bats. Reportedly teams like Toronto, San Francisco, Texas and St. Louis began taking serious consideration in Lohse as his asking price dipped to 1-year, $5-million. On March 14th, the St. Louis Cardinals, riddled with various injuries to the starting rotation, signed Lohse to a 1-year, $4.25 option-laden contact.

"He can make pitches, he's not out there just heaving it," Cardinals pitching guru Dave Duncan said after Lohse reported to spring training. "There's been times when he's going out there and had overpowering type games and there's been times when he's gone out there and you wonder, 'What's he doing?"' Twins fans will probably remember Duncan's inquiry most memorably when it comes to Kyle's performance. While with the Twins Lohse constantly alternated between very good starts and piss-poor outings. It was in 2006 when he only to produce three starts in eight with Game Scores higher than 50 (50 being the quality threshold). In that stretch he was averaging Game Scores of 33 and allowing opponents to hit .339/.400/.500 off of him in that stretch. After a 2.2 inning, five-run debacle at Comerica on May 16th, 2006 solidified Lohse's demotion to triple-A. This demotion finally opened the door to move Francisco Liriano into the starting rotation. The subsequent demotion was followed by a brief stint in the Twins bullpen then a mercy trade to Cincinnati for minor league flounderer Zach Ward (now being converted into a reliever at double-A).

In his 63 innings of work with the Reds, Lohse improved his control walking far fewer batters and increased his strikeout rate through the transition to the National League but was still hit fairly hard in his 11 starts (.278/.329/.426). The following season with a bad Cincinnati team, Lohse started the season 1-6, getting hit hard in his 57.6 innings of work (.318/.350/.502). Between then and July 25th, he fared better, eking out five victories while losing six and bringing down his opponents batting line to .247/.331/.402 in 74 innings of work. Cincinnati however was treading water near the bottom of the NL Central with a record of 43-59 and intuitively decided to be sellers at the trade deadline. Lohse was flipped to Philadelphia for minor league left-handed pitcher Matt Maloney. Philadelphia was attempting dethrone the New York Mets for the NL East title and was at the time in third place five games back from the Metropolitans. Though his record indicates that Lohse would finish 3-0 in 11 starts for the Phillies in that span, the team went 8-3 in his starts propelling them past the nose-diving New Yorkers by one game to win the division. "We had a lot of fun going down the stretch," said Lohse, reminiscing about his run with Philly, "From Day 1 when I got over there [to Philadelphia], it was like a playoff atmosphere every game. I can't think of a better time that I've had, because guys were competing and doing everything it took to win. We pulled it off. "

It is hard to see who is going to come out on top of that trade. If the objective to acquiring Lohse was to help get the Phillies into the post-season the mission was accomplished, however once there, Lohse was asked to retire Kaz Matsui with the bases loaded in a critical spot of Game 2 at Coors Field clinging to a 3-2 lead. Instead of maintaining the lead, Matsui crushed Lohse's offering to right for a grand slam on the way to a 10-5 victory (and later the series). On the other hand, Matt Maloney is proving to be a genuine left-handed pitching prospects, the value of developing a left-handed starting pitcher to a franchise is substantial. So far this season, the 24-year-old Maloney has struck out 93 and walked 28 in 100 innings of work at triple-A Louisville and recently shutout Rochester 8-0. Maloney could very well prove to be a welcomed addition to the already existing talent of Edison Volquez, Homer Bailey and Johnny Cueto as the Reds attempt to build a sustained winning franchise with affordable talent developed from within. The Phillies, on the other hand, with their aging pitching (30.8) staff currently led the NL East but do not have major league ready pitching in their farm system.

With 11 team wins in 18 of Lohse's starts thus far into the 2008 season, the Cardinals are should be very pleased with his low-cost performance. His 10-2 record with a 3.67 era is going to earn him All Star considerations. A phrase that might have been unheard of in his tenure as a Twins. "I feel like a completely different pitcher out there," Lohse said after his June 30th 7-1 victory over the Mets, the team that passed on him this past offseason, for his 10th victory of the year. "I'm not trying to guess my way through the lineup. I know what I want to do. It's worked out really well." Is the recent success of Kyle Lohse based upon a legitimate improvement or a statistical aberration?

On the surface, judging from his strikeout and walk rates coupled with his batting average on balls in play and run support dating back to his 26-year-old season (2005) we find little evidence to suggest that this season is anything but a fluke:

year	k%	bb%	babip	run support	average game score
2005	11.1%	5.7%	.312	3.36	48
2006	17.1%	7.7%	.341	4.56	43
2007	15.5%	6.8%	.307	4.45	48
2008	11.4%	5.9%	.289	4.63	51
career	14.2%	7.0%	.306	x	x

What we can ascertain is that his strikeout rate is lower than every year but his 2005 season as well as his walk rate. In 2006 and 2007 both the strikeout and walk rates increased. After his terrible 2006 season, Lohse's 2007 batting average on balls in play lowered and his run support increased. This lead to better starts which is indicated by his 48 game score average. What differentiates his 2008 season with the rest is that not only did his strikeout and walk rate rescind back to the 2005 totals, but his average on balls in play has been at an all-time low (.289) in addition to his run support being greater than any of the rest of the previous seasons. This has resulted in an average game score of a quality start in each outing. The additional runs provided by his offense has translated into more victories. Does this mean it is luck or that something in Lohse's approach has changed?

year	ops	rhb - ops	lhb - ops
2005	.799	.788	.813
2006	.804	.838	.757
2007	.786	.793	.779
2008	.709	.674	.754
career	.787	.749	.825

Looking back on his opponents OPS (on-base plus slugging) we find that the splits between right-handed batters and left-handed batters have fluctuated wildly. For instance, in 2005 left-handed batters did much better against Lohse while in 2006 the results were much different: right-handed batters bested Lohse. In 2007 right-handed batters repeated but did not generate enough of a difference to consider it that significant of a split. This year left-handed batters are doing better but are failing to hit better against him this year than any other year. How has his pitch selection varied from year to year?

year	fastball	slider	change	curve	cut
	usage | mph	usage | mph	usage | mph	usage | mph	usage | mph
2005	54% | 91.6	23% | 85.2	11% | 82.2	1% | 78.0	1% | 88.2
2006	53% | 91.9	22% | 85.0	14% | 83.1	0% | 77.3	6% | 88.7
2007	52% | 90.8	23% | 84.9	18% | 82.3	6% | 75.2	0% | 0
2008	59% | 90.1	23% | 83.5	10% | 82.7	6% | 75.5	0% | 0

After landing late in the spring with the Cardinals, Lohse has made some adjustments under the Cardinals pitching coach Dave Duncan's tutelage, a pitching professor that has been able to squeeze more out of his pitchers than anyone else. One of the biggest alterations was focusing more on locating the fastball better and a serious change-up reduction. It would behoove him to do as such considering that the slider and the change have been thrown at the same velocity. This would mean that his change-up is basically a hanging slider.

year	fastball	slider	change	curve	cut
	rhb | lhp	rhb | lhp	rhb | lhb	rhb | lhb	rhb | lhb
2005	53% | 54%	28% | 16%	6% | 16%	2% | 1%	1% | 2%
2006	52% | 53%	29% | 12%	7% | 21%	1% | 0%	5% | 7%
2007	54% | 49%	25% | 20%	14% | 22%	5% | 7%	0% | 0%
2008	59% | 59%	36% | 7%	3% | 20%	2% | 12%	0% | 0%

The Cardinals and Dave Duncan reestablished Lohse's confidence in his fastball. So far this season, Lohse is throwing his fastball nearly 60% of the time to both right-handed and left-handed batters. This has led to him working ahead in the count getting strike one on the first pitch 64% of the time, an accomplishment he flirted with in 2006 when he started with a strike 63% of the time. The remainder of his career he was getting strike one on the first pitch 62% of the time or less. His approached to right-handers once he achieved strike one was to bust them with the slider, through the pitch that breaks away from their swings 36% of the time. He essentially uses the same formula with left-handed batters with the exception that he exchanges the slider (a pitch that would break into the swing of the lefty) for the change-up (a pitch that disrupts the swing all the same) but has the caveat of throwing the curveball more frequently.

Kyle Lohse will undoubtedly draw plenty of criticisms from experts that claim that Lohse's 2008 success is a false positive. When you analyze the first table, it is easy to make this assumption as well. Strikeouts are low and his batting average on balls in play is lower than any of his previous seasons on top of that his run support has been higher than it has been since his 26-year-old season. His velocity is also declining as he ages and presumably will be in the high-80s next season. But he is learning how to pitch and is pitching to his strengths (as well as his opponent's weaknesses) which is making his 2008 campaign successful. The multi-million dollar question is if Kyle Lohse will be this successful away from St. Louis if he chooses to sign a long-term deal with another franchise.

Notebook Dump (07.01.08)

Game: Twinks 4, Tigers 5

Box Score

Record: 45-38, 2nd, 2.5 games back

Streak: 1 loss

The Quote: "When you have lead and go to our bullpen normally it holds up. Tonight it didn't... We just couldn't get them out tonight and we end up losing a ballgame." - Ron Gardenhire

The Inning: What's a bench coach-slash-third base coach-slash-acting manager to do? Scott Ullger's squad was clinging to a three-run lead in the top of the seventh against a very potent offense. A Detroit line-up that had devoured left-handed starters to the tune of 15 wins and just 5 losses while hitting .296/.368/.446 and the Twins left-handed starter Glen Perkins had spent the evening scattering six hits around his eight strike outs. Sure, Marcus Thames in the second inning did the one thing that Marcus Thames does well which is hit home runs. Thankfully for Perkins, it was a harmless solo shot. So far in 2008 Marcus Thames is hitting a home run every 11.2 plate appearances. The frequency increases to a home run every 10.5 plate appearances when facing left-handed pitching. In his following two plate appearances against Perkins, Perk struck Thames out with good 90+ mph fastballs. Thames is a microcosm of everything the Tigers are in the past two weeks. In the past 14 days, Thames has hit .382/.417/.794 while hitting 4 home runs. As a team the Motown Cats having been hitting .317/.369/.506 in that same span. In the past 14 games, the Tigers have scored 5.8 runs per game. Entering the final third of a game while holding this offense to just the solitary run is almost a victory in and of itself.

Unfortunately "almost" is only good in horseshoes and hand grenades.

In the sixth inning Perkins had retired the aforementioned Thames (on the second strike out), Gary Sheffield (on a nasty 79-mile per hour curveball that dove towards Sheff's shins) and Ivan Rodriguez (on a 2-1 fastball that Rodriguez lifted to Alexi Casilla in short right) with 11 pitches. His pitch count was at 85 pitches through those six innings. When the bottom half of the inning concluded and the Twins' hitters tacked on one more to stretch the lead to three, it was obvious that Ullger was letting Perkins take the mound with a short leash to face the eighth (Ryan Raburn), ninth (Curtis Granderson) and lead-off (Edgar Renteria) hitters. In his most recent start in San Diego, Perkins needed 91 pitches to complete five innings before being lifted. The start before that Perkins used 107 pitches to get through 8 innings of baseball against the Washington Nationals but had a comfortable lead against a very bad hitting team. Before that, Perkins made consecutive starts of 93 pitches each. Only six times in his career has he been asked to face a batter after throwing 100 pitches. The seventh inning would start with the right-handed batting Ryan Raburn. In his small sample size of 33 plate appearances in 2008 against left-handed pitching, Raburn had show power as indicated by his slugging of .563. In his two prior at-bats, Perkins had gotten him to pop out to center and ground into a fielder's choice with Rodriguez being forced at second. Raburn pulled a slow curve to Brian Buscher at third who tossed across the diamond to retire him for the first out. The Raburn at-bat cost Perkins five more pitches bringing his nightly total to 90. The next two would have to be very efficient match-ups if Perkins expected to finish the seventh. It would be a difficult task to make Granderson, a batter that averages 4.2 pitches per plate appearance, and Renteria, who averages 3.6 per plate appearance, to hack quickly this late in the game.

Granderson has typically been a spectator when the opposing teams start a left-handed pitcher. Just 20% of his career plate appearances totals have come against southpaws. His .207/.268/.367 career line coupled with a 27% strikeout rate is reason enough to clear some space on the bench for him. Regardless, manager Jim Leyland penciled him in against Perkins to unexpected results. In his first at-bat, Granderson singled up the middle. He was called out on strikes in his second at-bat but he made Perkins throw seven pitches to get the out. Perkins feed him fastballs away. The first one, up and out of the zone, Granderson chased and fouled. The second was low and away which was taken for a ball. With a one-and-one count and one out, Perkins returned to the outer half of the plate with a fastball - one that caught too much of the plate as Granderson lined it to center. With a runner on first and three right-handed batters due up, Ullger decided that 93 pitches was the magic number for Glen once again. Awkwardly, Ullger approached the mound, signalled for the right-handed Canuck Jesse Crain and fumbled for the ball out of Perk's hand who left the game with the runner in his name and a game score of 57.

Since the Milwaukee series at Miller Park, Crain has been nearly untouchable. In his 6 appearances and 5.2 innings of work, Crain has struck out seven and walked just one resulting in three holds and one blown save in San Diego (the Twins won anyways). Logically Crain would be the ideal seventh inning candidate to bridge to Matt Guerrier (or possibly one of the two left-handed option) in the eight to Joe Nathan in the ninth for the save. Crain and Guerrier led the team with 9 holds a piece. Crain walked Renteria on five pitches. This brought up Placido Polanco. Polanco, like the rest of the Tigers team, had been hitting exceptionally well the past two weeks. In 45 plate appearances in that time, Polanco had been hitting .415/.422/.532. It took one 95-mph fastball from Crain to Placido to bring Granderson home from second and move Renteria to 3rd.

Suddenly, the Twins were now clinging to a two-run lead with the tying run on first with Carlos Guillen now approaching the plate. It was evident that Crain simply did not have it. Ullger went to retrieve him only to replace him with Dennys Reyes. This to those that follow things like statistics, is a curious move. Reyes in his 38 match-ups against right-handed batters had seen a significant uptick in his platoon splits of .344/.447/.469 (lefties were hitting just .180/.226/.260 in 54 plate appearances). In 67 plate appearances against left-handed pitching the switch-hitting Carlos Guillen had hit lefties at a .333/.409/.544 rate while batting from the right side of the plate. Managerially, Ullger was attempting to play one move ahead thinking Reyes could retire Guillen then easily handle the left-handed batting Clete Thomas. Most often, it is better to focus on the task at hand as one slider from Reyes to Guillen and the lead quickly vanished to one with Polanco moving to scoring position with just the one out. This would be the first earned run the bullpen would allow in nearly 25 innings of work. Reyes, as predicted, got the left-handed batting Thomas to ground out to short. Then Ullger was forced to make one more move. With Marcus Thames coming up Ullger reached in for his last right-handed set-up man in Matt Guerrier. Guerrier used five pitches to strikeout Thames, getting him to watch his big curve for strike three.

In just one inning, the Twins bullpen need three arms to get two outs. I don't necessarily blame Ullger for the first two maneuvers. Perkins was nearing hit pitch threshold. Crain had been rested for three days and was ineffective and had to be removed. Guillen, however, was the difficult decision. His platoon splits on his career suggest he hits better left-handed but on the season he has been far better against left-handed pitching indicating that a match-up against a right-handed arm might have been more appropriate. Second-guessing aside, this is not the way a team would like to open a three-game series against a very good hitting team by burning through most of their bullpen. Yes, Kevin Slowey's complete game shutout gave the relievers an extra day of rest allowing both Crain and Reyes to enter the game on three days of rest but even though the two relievers threw less than 10 pitches and could be called on to perform in one of the next two Tigers games. Unfortunately now Guerrier, after tossing 30 pitches and eventually being accountable for the loss in the eighth inning, is probably unavailable for tonight's game and might also need Wednesday off too.

2008: 2nd Quarter Review

With 82 games finished in the 2008 season, the Twins have found themselves positioned well. At 45-37, the Twins are the owners of the fifth best record in the American League, trailing the White Sox by a game and a half in the Central following Sunday's victory over the Milwaukee Brewers. As was the case with the results of the first quarter of the season (Game 1 through 41), Minnesota is an overachieving team. Sporting a 42-40 expected win-loss record the Twins have stole three wins reinforcing once again that baseball isn't always as predictable as statistics would suggest. Last season, the Twins posted the exact record (42-40) as the current expected win-loss record through 82 games. Instead of being in the thick of a division the Twins were buried 8.5 games out behind Cleveland and Detroit. The second-half of the season last year was a huge disappointment as the team played .463 baseball the rest of the way (37-43) in 2007.

The current season's second quarter (Game 42 through 82) record of 23-17 was supplemented with the 10 game winning streak combined with a 14-3 run in the past 17 games. Prior to that streak the 2008 Twins seemed destined to sink into oblivion. In the 12 games before the run began, the Twins went 3-9 including an embarrassing four-game sweep at the hands of the White Sox. To add salt, the Twins were outscored 40 to 15. The starting pitching was absolutely destroyed at US Cellular. Nick Blackburn, Livan Hernandez and Kevin Slowey were pounded in consecutive outings for game scores of 18, 19 and 10, respectively. The bullpen was taxed to the limits. After having the longest losing streak of the season (six) the Twins started a 10 game winning streak a week later. There are several moves and factors that have been critical to this resurgence at the midway point.

* Mauer is healthy. No need to search on WebMD for something Joe Mauer related. Last year Twins catcher Joe Mauer's various left leg maladies limited him to 50 games in the first half of the season. His slashes were very good (.302/.392/.464) in his 224 plate appearance in the first half of 2007, however, in 2008 Mauer has been healthy enough to play in 72 games and while maintaining that same output (.326/.411/.466) in 79 more plate appearances. This sustained production has led to Mauer overtaking Boston's Jason Varitek in the All-Star voting. Having someone who is reaching base 41% of the time in the line-up fills a great prerequisite for scoring a run. He takes pitches (23 bbs to 11 ks) and has also found his power swing jacking three home runs in the second quarter as well as having a .225 isolated slugging average in the month of June.

* Interleague Play. Can the Twins petition the Commissioner's office to have the team reassigned to the Senior Circuit? The Twins are 14-3 against the National League opponents and to some people's surprise, Gardenhire managed the club well under the National League rules winning 6 of 9 on the road.

* Releasing Juan Rincon... Yes, he had at one time been the sturdiest of bridges from the 7th and 8th inning to the closer. Unfortunately seeing Rincon on the mound in 2008 meant that the Twins were either winning big or losing big (and if they weren't before Rincon's appearance, they certainly would be shortly thereafter). In his 11.1 innings of work in the second quarter of 2008, opponents had hit 3 home runs along with a .404/.492/.673 batting line. What's more is that in those 9 games Rincon came to the mound with five baserunners on and all five would score. Had Rincon been younger and more affordable, losing an arm like Rincon might have been an issue for an organization however after declining assignment Rincon is now Cleveland's problem where he is at triple-A Buffalo working on his mechanics.

* ...Gaining Craig Breslow. So Cleveland doesn't want Breslow but will accept Rincon with open arms? I thought General Manager Mark Shapiro and Assistant General Manager Chris Antonetti were supposedly the great sabermetric braintrust at the helm of the Indians organization. Reviewing the statistics, there is nothing to suggest that this was even close to intelligent. The Twins have recieved 10 innings of the lefty Breslow and he has yet to yield a run. In those 10 innings, Breslow has been asked to strand 6 runners on base, a task that he has completed with flying colors. In order to maintain this kind of production the Twins need to continue to bring him into situations that he would have greater opportunity to succeed, namely against lefties. The Breslow addition has also alleviate the usage of Dennys Reyes. In his 16 innings prior to the Breslow acquisition, Reyes's slashes were decent (.290/.343/.371) but possibly a cause for concern if Reyes would be the only left-handed option for Gardenhire out of the bullpen. Post-Breslow Reyes has thrown 6.2 innings and has stepped up admirably (.100/.250/.250). Sure Breslow's scoreless streak is bound to come to an end but having him in the bullpen gives Gardenhire that option that will keep from having to burn out Reyes's arm.

* The Slow-Man. Aside from his tango with the white hot White Sox, Kevin Slowey has been pitching like an ace this quarter of the season. In his last four starts, Slowey is 3-0 with a 0.93 era. This, of course, was capped off by Sunday afternoon's surgical precision carving up the dangerous Milwaukee Brewers line-up for a complete game three hitter striking out 8 along the way. If Minnesota wants to experience post-season dreams, the Twins are going to need Slowey as the complement to Scott Baker at the top end of the starting rotation. While nothing is promised with Francisco Liriano and with Livan Hernandez inconsistencies, Slowey is the stabilizer that the rotation needs going forward.

* Recalling Alexi Casilla. Technically Casilla was recalled with two games remaining in the first quarter, but his production in the second has been one of the biggest reasons the Twins are still within striking distance of the White Sox. In 163 plate appearances in the second quarter, Casilla has hit .314/.363/.450 in the number two spot in the order. His patience and bat control is the perfect antidote to Carlos Gomez's flaying plate approach. On the field Casilla is electric at turning the doubleplay (ranked 9th among MLB second basemen according to the Fielding Bible), something that the pitching staff is greatly appreciative of, but his overall ability is still raw. Moving to his left he is above average however he is rated below average at plays up the middle. His revised zone rating of .762 is one of the worst among professional second basemen. Still, his offense is carrying his glove for the time being.

* Brian Buscher at Third. This time the promotion better stick. In his 47 plate appearances since his second recall, Buscher is pummeling major league pitching with a .372/.383/.465 batting line. His hands and range are brutal (.759 rzr) but it looks like Brooks Robinson compared to Mike Lamb (.602 rzr). The disappointment of Mike Lamb is overwhelming, considering that there is still another year on his 2-year contract that the Twins will either eventually eat or Bill Smith will prove that he can barter a cow for magic beans at the trade deadline. Personally, the former seems to be the logical result of the Lamb era. Nevertheless, Buscher is doing at third what the Twins would have liked from Lamb...for pennies on the dollar. Had Smith considered the option of carrying Buscher and Matt Macri has the third base platoon instead of signing Lamb, the team might have a few more victories under their belt instead of insisting on trotting Lamb to the plate as frequently as they have.