The Twins have a long history of dominating interleague competition and they've generally looked very good when playing at Target Field this season. Unfortunately, they lost two of three at home against the Braves this weekend because neither of those trends could outweigh their recent silence with the bats.
After scoring 118 runs in April and 133 in May, the Twins are on pace to score just 99 in June. They briefly emerged from their recent offensive slump by beating up on the Royals throughout a three-game series last week, but outside of that series the Twins simply have not been putting many runs on the board over the past few weeks.
It's not difficult to find the culprit for the team's recent drop-off in run production. Their thin infield depth has been exposed by injuries to both Orlando Hudson and J.J. Hardy. Trevor Plouffe and Matt Tolbert, called up to help fill the big-league club's middle-infield void, have both struggled immensely on offense, and lamentably Ron Gardenhire's misguided lineup decisions have enabled those poor performances to cause increased negative impact at the top of the batting order. Brendan Harris, forced into duty by the various injuries around the infield, has stunningly continued to show no offensive pulse whatsoever. He has just five hits -- all singles -- in his last 53 at-bats.
Hudson is expected to return to the lineup on Tuesday, and the Twins need to hope he's healthy enough to pick up where he left off because they could sorely use a jolt at the top of the lineup. We'll still probably be looking at a regular left-side combination of Plouffe and Nick Punto, which will likely continue to be an offensive liability. Hudson will be most welcome, though, because he will keep Plouffe and Tolbert out of the second spot in the lineup.
Monday, June 14, 2010
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18 comments:
Hardy is not much of a loss offensively.
His bat was a lot more potent than Plouffe's.
I was at the game yesterday and almost had a conniption when I saw Punto leading off followed by Plouffe. This idea of "the Twins stick players in roles, and everyone knows their role, and it's best this way" is reaching the realm of absurdity. Mauer wasn't batting third in that lineup. He was leading off with two outs.
Compared to Plouffe/Harris/Punto, Hardy's friggin Babe Ruth.
David, well put. It's one thing to not want to mess with the batting order when most of the guys are going good, but this lineup has been sputtering along lately for the most part. I think it's pretty shameful for a major-league manager to fail to realize how much he's damaging his team's offensive chances by putting his two worst hitters at the top of the batting order.
Nick, you're forgetting about Butera. He is somehow so much worse than those two. Officially he's hitting like .120, which seems real high to me. I don't remember him ever getting a hit, nor can I even imagine it - the look on his face says he's out before he even steps in the box.
Or continuing to bat Delmon Young 7th and not even thinking about moving Cuddyer and his .211 RISP average down the lineup. At some point you'd think he'd at least CONSIDER rewarding a hot bat and moving up to 5th.
Nick, you're forgetting about Butera. He is somehow so much worse than those two. Officially he's hitting like .120, which seems real high to me. I don't remember him ever getting a hit, nor can I even imagine it - the look on his face says he's out before he even steps in the box.
Butera is terrible, obviously, but he's not hurting the team nearly as much because he's only playing about once per week and he's not hitting second in the lineup.
Sebastian,
Great point. Young s/b batting 5th and Cuddy 7th.
Gardy won't do it though, despite Cuddy's tenancies to get meaningless hits, and fail with RISP.
I think it's pretty shameful for a major-league manager to fail to realize how much he's damaging his team's offensive chances by putting his two worst hitters at the top of the batting order.
Agreed. I was particularly irked by Gardenhire somehow implying that the lineup had nothing to do with anything, that he didn't care about the lineup, yadda yadda yadda. Thanks Gardy. Hope the twins enjoy my major league money to watch half of a bad AAA team.
when does morales come back?
when does morales come back?
He's healthy and playing in Rochester right now, he's played 28 games down there. Whatever the Twins' reason for keeping Butera on the big-league roster, it's not because Morales isn't available.
Agree with Delmon and Cuddy switching spots....Cuddy does nothing with people in scoring positions...and the middle infielders are killing us at the plate...plus Punto
Punto: has only .298 ob%. If he doesn't draw walks he has no value offensively for the twins.
Harris: no RBI's since 4/21
That's almost 85 AB's and almost 8 weeks. Incredible for any player.
Butera: no walks this season. They are 3-8 when he starts. But everyone seems to think his defense justifies his roster spot.
Plouffe: looks overmatched but what other option is there?
I think nick n. is fair in his critisim of gardy. moving mauer up to 2nd and cuddy down would have been a logical option but the guy does nothing.
jack torse
Punto has been a point of frustration with me for years. I have a tough time when Gardy (and many Twins fans) rationalize that his glove outweighs his offensive ineptitude. I also agree with the comments regarding Gardy's lineup decisions. I can't tell whether he is misguided or just stubborn. You can't simply plug in players based on who they are replacing. I was always annoyed when Gardy used to put Redmond in the 3 spot on Mauer's days off. Hopefully Hudson and Hardy get back to full health again and we trade for a thirdbaseman. That or move Cuddy to 3B and let Thome take over fulltime DH. I think Thome would be a lot more productive if given consistent ABs. Look at his OBP, he still provides plate presence and discipline to help protect the other guys in the lineup.
There is a small upside to Punto not being good offensively this year. At least the Twins won't pay him 5 million next year. I hope he goes the way of the buffalo.
Span
Mauer
Cuddyer
Morneau
Delmon
Kubel
Valencia
Plouffe
Punto
Now that doesn't look that awful to me. Mix up those 3-6 hitters anyway you like just don't stick an awful bat in the 2 hole.
Haven't there been studies (Tom Tango maybe) showing that lineup construction makes basically no difference? I mean, I get what you're saying but I doubt it has any effect on the W-L record. Crappy players are crappy all over the place.
I can't speak for Butera or Plouffe, but I do know that Harris and Punto - especially Punto - have hit baseball's version of the Power Ball jackpot. It is funded by the Twin's brain trust and to collect, all you have to do is put on a funny costume, travel first class and futilely wave and miss at pitched baseballs for eight months a year.
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