Minnesota Twins ALDS Preview – Is this the Year they Beat the New York Yankees?

Posted on October 4, 2019 by Robb
The Battle of the Bombas Begins Tonight!

The Minnesota Twins and the New York Yankees have a history of meeting in the playoffs and for Minnesota, it has never ended with a series victory. The history is depressing so we’ll just show you the results and go from there. 

Why rehash it? Especially when there are only 9 players/pitchers who are still playing for the Minnesota Twins since the last playoff game in 2017.

On Wednesday, the media eluded to a mystique or intimidation of the New York Yankees and Yankee Stadium in the playoffs. Rocco said he doesn’t believe in that at all:
“Rocco, I know this team doesn’t care about past history against the Yankees but you have to admit there’s somewhat of an intimidation factor in Yankee Stadium in the playoffs. How do you think your team will respond to that, especially the guys who haven’t been in this situation before?”

Twins Manager Rocco Baldelli:
“I wouldn’t agree with the preface there. I don’t think it is that. It’s a different energy. I think it’s..you know you’re in New York City. It’s a big city. There’s a different feel to everything that you do when you fly into, you know, the airport, jump on the bus and head into the big city. That being said, I don’t find it intimidating at all. I’ve been a part of many, many games in that ballpark and been a part of many, many great efforts in that ballpark and winning efforts so I don’t see it and I think that the fans and everyone who has followed the Twins for a long time have watched and potentially watched every game that the Twins have played have many thoughts about these types of games but as far as our players and in our clubhouse, I don’t think any of our guys care one bit about what has happened here previously and I think our guys are about as confident going into the series as you can be.”

As a fan who has watched all of the games against the Yankees in the playoffs, I can definitely see what the media is referring to but I’m not sure I ever thought any Twins players thought it was intimidating. Ron Gardenhire was maybe afraid to put a player in a position to fail in a game before so…maybe there is something to that. That’s another part of the reason this 2019 Minnesota Twins team is different. They haven’t been afraid to throw anyone into the lineup or on the mound and none of those players were afraid to be put in those situations, either. Nervous? Sure. Definitely but not afraid. This is where they want to be.

It comes down to the Yankees are good and usually very good. They have a lot of talented players and usually the best roster money can buy but they also develop well. They didn’t buy Aaron Judge or Brett Gardner or, well, that’s about it on their current roster but there are other great examples like Derek Jeter and Jorge Posada.

This series also seems like a different series because usually, the Minnesota Twins are not even close to the New York Yankees in terms of talent. It’s probably because of the injuries but the Yankees are kind of shaky in the starting rotation and in their lineup. They will also have no Aaron Hicks, no Mike Tauchman and no CC. Sabathia.

The Twins out-homered the Yankees in the regular season. I didn’t look but it’s hard for me to imagine that’s ever happened before. We know it hasn’t ever happened when they’ve met in the postseason. The closest the Twins ever were in Home Runs to the Yankees was two years ago when the Twins hit just 35 fewer (206) Home Runs than the Yankees (241).

The lineup just scores runs and they score fast so they’re rarely out of a game. The lineup should look pretty much the same as the regular season minus injured Byron Buxton and maybe without Luis Arraez. Mitch Garver will likely lead off versus a lefty then Jorge Polanco, Nelson Cruz, Eddie Rosario, Miguel Sano, Max Kepler, Marwin Gonzalez, CJ Cron & Jonathan Schoop. If Arraez is in the lineup, obviously he’s probably pretty high up in the lineup.

The Yankee lineup isn’t bad by any means. They did finish just 1 home run behind the Twins for the most home runs in baseball this season at 306 so they can score just as fast and in bunches as well. 

The Twins might also have a better bullpen and better options for the starting rotation. How crazy is that? The Twins bullpen has been very good since the trade deadline with pitchers that you wouldn’t have guessed would be prominent names at the beginning of the season. RHPs Tyler Duffey, Trevor May, Zack Littell and Sergio Romo and LHP Taylor Rogers are major reasons the Twins should be able to stay in and maybe even win this series.

The Minnesota Twins will likely go with Jose Berrios for Game 1, Randy Dobnak for Game 2 and Jake Odorizzi for Game 3. They would probably use the bullpen for Game 4 then come back with Jose Berrios in Game 5 if the series goes that long.

The Yankees will go with LHP James Paxton in Game 1, RHP Masahiro Tanaka in Game 2 and RHP Luis Severino in Game 3. I could see RHP Chad Green starting/opening Game 4 then back to Paxton for Game 5. 

Health may be the biggest factor in this series as both teams have questions about their starting players and their pitchers. The Yankees have Gary Sanchez coming back from a groin injust and Edwin Encarnacion coming back from an oblique injury. They also have Giancarlo Stanton who came back from a knee sprain and has been hitting pretty well.

The Twins have Max Kepler coming back from a chest/shoulder injury. Marwin Gonzalez was rested so he’d good to go. C.J. Cron just came back from his thumb injury and, of course, the ankle of Luis Arraez has been a very important body part to Minnesota Twins fans since Sunday. It sounds like he’s doing better. This is what Rocco Baldelli had to say about him:

He’s (Arraez) healed really well, probably faster than anybody anticipated and he’s putting himself in a spot where we’re taking this question very seriously…

The Twins will release their ALDS roster after this posts so we’re still not sure how it will look. We made our final playoff roster choices on Wednesday.

The Twins will go with RHP Jose Berrios in Game 1 and he’ll be opposed by LHP James Paxton. The Twins enjoy hitting against left-handed pitching.

Is this the year the Twins finally get over that Yankee hump? We’ll leave you with another Rocco quote about the series:

“For people that are sitting at home, grab a drink and put your feet up and enjoy. It’s going to be a fun series and our players are just waiting for the first pitch. They’re ready to go.” – Rocco Baldelli


Did you like this? Share it:
Posted in Baseball News and Happenings, Minnesota Twins, Schedule | Leave a comment

Minnesota Twins Recap at the Kansas City Royals – September 28th

Posted on September 28, 2019 by Robb
Minnesota Twins at the Kansas City Royals Game 2 with RHP Cody Stashak on the Mound.

The #MNTwins sent RHP Cody Stashak to the mound to start today’s game in Kansas City against the Kansas City Royals so that meant it was going to be a bullpen game for the Minnesota Twins. The Royals countered with RHP Glenn Sparkman.

The scoring got underway in the bottom of the 1st when OF Jorge Soler took the American League lead in Home Runs with his 46th of the season. The Twins would tie the game at 1 when 1B Willians The Turtle Astudillo hit his 9th double of the season to score C Mitch Garver, who got on with his 15th double of the season.

Stashak got through the 2nd perfectly with one strikeout and RHP Kyle Gibson, still trying to find a way to help his team, pitched the 3rd inning. He needed 32 pitches to get through it but he didn’t allow a run but he allowed a single and two walks, loading the bases with 2 outs before getting a strikeout to end the inning. It’s hard to know if Gibby will be able to help the Twins in the postseason so it will be interesting to see what they do. We’ll predict a Game 1 roster next week.

Zack Littell pitched a perfect 4th with 2 strikeouts. It was a Littell Inning! Littell by Littell.

In the top of the 5th, OF Ian Miller led off with his 1st MLB Double and 1st MLB Extra Base hit then Luis Arraez grounded out to 1st to advance Miller to 3rd and Jorge Polanco hit a sacrifice fly to center field to put the Twins up 2-1.

LHP Lewis Thorpe pitched the 5th and allowed a 1-out single and a stolen base but also struck one and got out of the inning in with the 1-run lead still intact.

Mitch Garver hit a 1-out double (16) for his 2nd double of the day and he was once again knocked in by Willians Astudillo, this time with a single, though. 3-1 Twins.

RHP Trevor May pitched the 6th, allowing a leadoff single but got a flyout and two strikeouts looking to get the Twins through 6 innings.

RHP Tyler Duffey got the 7th with a 23.2 innings scoreless streak on the line. He struck out the 1st two batters swinging then allowed a single and, unfortunately, he hung a slider on the first pitch to Jorge Soler and gone went the ball, the lead and the scoreless-innings streak, which ended at 24.1 innings but, hey, he’s now at .1 scoreless innings. I kid! I kid! Duff’s been on a great roll out of the ‘pen. He’ll be fine.

Duffey’s teammate, Nelson Cruz, doesn’t like losing and he really likes hitting Bombas so he did something about the game being tied up in the bottom of the 6th. He took a 3-2 pitch from RHP Jacob Burnes and gave it to a fan in left field and the game was no longer tied. 4-3 Twins.

RHP Sergio Romo pitched a perfect 8th with a strikeout and some emotion and LHP Taylor Rogers was called in from the ‘pen to pitch the 9th inning. He was looking for his 30th save of the season.

He struck out the first batter, ended up walking the next batter, then got a Nick Dini to ground into a game-ending 4-3 double play, Jonathan Schoop fielded the ball, stepped on 2nd and threw to 1st for 30 Saves for Taylor Rogers and win #101 for the Minnesota Twins!

In the minors, Taylor Rogers had 1 hold & 1 blown save over his 5-year, 99 game minor-league career and before this season, he had 57 holds and 2 saves in 4 opportunities. In 2019, he has 10 holds and now 30 saves in 36 opportunities. That’s quite a transformation into a lethal left-handed pitcher out of the Minnesota Twins Bullpen!

The Twins may have suffered another big injury in the bottom of the 7th when Hunter Dozier popped up for the final out. Duffey pointed to it and both Willians Astudillo & Luis Arraez were calling for it. Astudillo caught hit but they collided and Astudillo ended up stepping on Arraez’ right foot which made his right leg straighten out and maybe hyperextend and he went down and grabbed the back of his leg. That made most fans really worried about the knee or maybe even ligaments. He was carted off the field so he either felt he couldn’t put weight on the leg or just didn’t want to chance it.

Will Luis Arraez again?

It was reported later that x-rays were negative and he suffered an ankle sprain. We’ll for sure hear more about it later. We’ll put the video of the incident and of Rocco talking about it in the comments section.

Minnesota Twins Manager Rocco Baldelli on the Luis Arraez injury.

#LaTortuga felt terrible about it but, at the end of the game, CJ Cron went up to him and put his arm around him to let him know it’s okay & it’s just something that happened. There was nothing he could do about it.

We need you, too, ‘Tuga!!! ‘TUGA! ‘TUGA!! ‘TUGA!!!

The Twins will go for a franchise-record-tying 102 wins tomorrow afternoon. They have LHP Martin Perez scheduled to start the regular-season finale against Kansas City LHP Jorge Lopez at 2:15pm on Fox Sports North.

Also, it’s settled. The Twins will face the New York Yankees in the first round of the MLB Playoffs starting with Game 1 on Friday, time TBD.

Next week’s schedule is said to be…Day off Monday, Workout at Target Field on Wednesday, Fly to New York on Wednesday, Workout at Yankee Stadium on Thursday and Game 1 Friday!

Are you ready for another series against the Twins playoff nemesis Yankees? Will this year be different? Is this team different? It feels like they are so it should be interesting.

Did you like this? Share it:
Posted in Baseball News and Happenings | Leave a comment

Minnesota Twins Recap at the Detroit Tigers – September 26th, 2019

Posted on September 27, 2019 by Robb
Smeltzer was on the mound for the after-party game. How’d the Minnesota Twins do today?

The #MNTwins had to play a game at 1:10pm after celebrating for a couple hours after last night’s clinching of the American League Central Division Title.

So…that meant it was a mostly reserve lineup today:
Ian Miller – LF (Still looking for his 1st Major League Hit)
Luis Arraez – 2B
Willians Astudillo – 3B
Jake Cave – RF
Jonathan Schoop – DH
Jason Castro – C
Ryan LaMarre – CF
LaMonte Wade – 1B (1st game at 1st base in his career including the minors)
Ronald Torreyes – SS
LHP Devin Smeltzer got the start.

The Twins went down 1-2-3 in the top of the 1st and Smeltzer allowed a couple hits but also struck out 2 and got a flyout to end the 1st.
2ndTwins – 1-2-3 in the 2nd, tooTigers – Flyout, single, single, strikeout, lineout.

In the top of the 3rd, Ronald Torreyes singled then stole 2nd base, his 1st stolen base of the season, and that brought Ian Miller to the plate. He had yet to get a hit in the Majors. He’s a career .274/.340/.357 (Average/On-Base %/Slugging %) hitter so he’s capable with the bat in his hands. On a 2-2 low fastball, he hit a grounder up the middle for his #1stMLBHit and his 1st MLB RBI all on one swing. CONGRATS, Ian!!! Twins 1-0.

Brandon Dixon led off the bottom of the 3rd with a triple to…Ian Miller. Weird. Miguel Cabrera then hit an RBI-groundout to 2nd to tie the game.
Willians #LaTortuga Astudillo then singled to lead off the 4th inning then advanced to 2nd on a passed ball. Jake Cave grounded out to 2nd. La Turtle advanced to 3rd on the play. Jonathan Schoop than hit an RBI-single to score The Turtle from 3rd and the Twins led once again. 2-1.
In the bottom of the 4th, Travis DeMeritte hit a 1-out double (7) and was knocked in with a Will Castro single and the game was tied at 2! Victor Reyes then singled to put the Detroit Tigers up 3-2.

The 5th inning began with Torreyes reaching on a fielding error then Ian Miller singled again (this is easy!), advancing Torreyes to 3rd. Arraez hit into a fielder’s choice. Torreyes out at home. Miller to 3rd. Arraez to 2nd. Then Astudillo singled again to bring Miller in and advance Arraez to 3rd base. Jake Cave tripled (2) to bring in both Arraez & Astudillo. A wild pitch eventually brought Cave in. 6-3.

Smeltzer allowed a couple more hits but got out of the inning with no damage and was then replaced by RHP Ryne Harper to pitch the 6th inning. He got the 1st batter to fly out but then Will Castro tripled to right field and was knocked in by another Victor Reyes RBI-single. Reyes then stole 2nd (8) but Harper struck out the next 2 batters to end the inning. 6-4 Twins.

Astudillo singled again to lead off the 7th inning and scored again when Jonathan Schoop hit his 23rd HR of the season and it was also the Minnesota Twins 200th HR of the season! No Team has ever hit 300 HRs in a single season before! The Yankees are at 299, though, so it could happen again….tomorrow. Ryan LaMarre then scored from 1st on a Wade single and a Tigers throwing error. 9-4 Twins.

Astudillo added a solo HR (4) for his 4th hit & 4th run of the game in the 8th inning and RHPs Brusdar Graterol, Fernando Romero & Jorge Alcala pitched the last 3 innings (1 each) allowing just 1 hit & 1 walk (both Romero) and striking out 5 (Romero 3, 1 each for Graterol & Alcala) to end the game.

That’s Win #99 for the Twins but word is they’ll use the last 3 games to prepare for the postseason.

Berrios is the scheduled pitcher for tomorrow night’s first game in KC. Odorizzi is scheduled for Sunday’s regular-season finale.

Did you like this? Share it:
Posted in Baseball News and Happenings | Leave a comment

Minnesota Twins Recap at the Detroit Tigers – September 24th, 2019

Posted on September 24, 2019 by Robb
The Minnesota Twins are in Detroit to start their final road trip of the season. 

The #MNTwins sent RHP Jake Odorizzi to the mound for Game 1 in Detroit against the Detroit Tigers.

The Minnesota Twins got a couple of singles from Luis Arraez & Nelson Cruz in the first inning but nothing came from them so Jake Odorizzi took the mound for the bottom of the first. He struck out the leadoff hitter but then allowed a double (9) to Dawel Lugo then a single to Harold Castro, advancing Lugo to 3rd base. Jeimer Candelario then hit a sacrifice fly to right field and the Tigers went up 1-0 early.

Willians Astudillo was the only baserunner for either team in the 2nd & 3rd innings when he walked in the top of the 2nd inning. They got a walk (Rosario) & a couple of 2-out singles but a lineout ended the threat.

It was a strange game as both teams had just 9 baserunners in the 1st 6 innings, Detroit with the 2 hits in the 1st & a walk in the 4th and the Twins with a couple of hits in the 1st & a couple more in the 4th and walks in the 2nd & 4th innings.

The top of the 7th began with a Jake Cave single and LaMonte Wade followed that with a double (2) then there was a Mound Visit & a Pitching Change before La Tortuga stepped to the plate and he ended up hitting a 2-run single to put the Twins in the lead at 2-1. Jason Castro was hit by a pitch that prompted Detroit Manager Ron Gardenhire to make another pitching change.

Luis Arraez grounded back to the pitcher for the first out but Cave & Wade advanced to 3rd & 2nd base. Jorge Polanco then lined out for the 2nd out and Nelson Cruz was intentionally walked to load the bases for EDDIE EDDIE EDDIE Rosario and he came through with a 2-run double (28) to put the Twins up 4-1.

Jake…from the Mound…was pitching great setting down 17 of 18 Tigers through the 6th inning but while warming up, the Twins staff noticed something and came out to talk to Odo and they ended up removing him from the game due to injured groin & they brought in RHP Kyle Gibson for his 3rd relief appearance of the season and of his career. He went strikeout swinging, single, strikeout swinging, single and strikeout swinging through the 7th.

Gibby came back out to pitch the 8th and allowed a leadoff double on a weakly hit ball to left field. He got Victor Reyes to lineout but then Dawel Lugo hit an RBI-double (10) to score the Tigers 2nd run. A mound visit may have settled Gibby down because he got the next two batters out on a groundout and another swinging strikeout.

The Twins couldn’t add anything in the top of the 9th so LHP Taylor “Mister” Rogers was summoned form the bullpen, looking to earn his 29th Save of the season. He got Christin Stewart to fly out to right and Brandon Dixon to groundout to short and then he struck out Travis Demeritte on a nasty slider to end the game.

Cleveland destroyed the White Sox by a score of 11-0. Indians 3B Jose Ramirez was activated off the IL and he hit a Grand Slam in his first at-bat then he hit another HR in his 2nd at-bat, a 3-run shot, finishing with 7 RBIs on the night! GEEZ!!!

Another Twins victory lowers the Magic Number to 2!!!

The Twins can clinch the Division and punch their ticket to the playoffs tomorrow night with a win and a Cleveland loss.

Twins Manager Rocco Baldelli announced RHP Randy Dobnak will start tomorrow’s game against Detroit LHP Daniel Norris at 5:40pm on Fox Sports North.

Did you like this? Share it:
Posted in Minnesota Twins, Schedule | Leave a comment

Is Minnesota Twins RHP Randy Dobnak The Wedding Pitcher?

Posted on September 23, 2019 by Robb
Minnesota‌ ‌Twins‌ ‌RHP‌ ‌Randy‌ ‌Dobnak‌ ‌has‌ ‌had‌ ‌an‌ ‌amazing‌ ‌season.‌ ‌ ‌

#MNTwins RHP Randy Dobnak has had a heckuva a season and a heckuva a career so far with the Minnesota Twins organization.

If you haven’t heard, he & his fiance scheduled their wedding 2 years ago to be held on September 28th, this coming Saturday, which is a strange date for a professional baseball player but read on to see why, at the time, it was completely understandable.

Twins RHP Randy Dobnak talks about his 1st MLB Win and how his life has changed over the past year.

He signed a minor league contract on August 1st, 2017 out Alderson Broaddus College in Phillipi, WV and was assigned to the Rookie-League Elizabethton Twins the next day. He pitched in just 5 games (3 starts) before being promoted to the Low-A Cedar Rapids Kernels and pitched 1 game before the regular season ended.

He then began 2018 at Cedar Rapids again and ended up pitching the whole season there and he was 10-5 with a 3.14 ERA and a 1.264 WHIP in 129 innings. He allowed 138 hits, 45 earned runs (6 home runs) and 24 walks while striking out 84 batters so a lot of hits but low walks but also low strikeout numbers in 24 games & 20 starts.

That’s still a good showing & he was older than the average Low-A player so the Twins started his 2019 season at the High-A Fort Myers Miracle and in 4 starts (or April), he was 3-0 with a 0.40 ERA & a 0.985 WHIP allowing just 1 run on 18 hits & 4 walks with 14 strikeouts in 22.1 innings so after those 4 starts it was on to the AA Pensacola Blue Wahoos. WAHOOOOOO!!!

He pitched in just 4 games there before he was promoted to the AAA @Rochester Red Wings just 23 days after getting to Pensacola. He pitched in 4 games and was sent back down to AA on May 25th. He then pitched in 7 games through July 18th before he was summoned back to AAA for 3 games and sometime between the end of his start on August 2nd and August 8th, he was called into the office of AAA Manager Joel Skinner and, maybe he thinks he’s going back down to AA again but, he’s told he’s going to The Show!!! Man, that must’ve been awesome! Just 2 years and 1 week or so before that, he had just signed a minor-league contract. In his Wildest Dreams, he couldn’t have imagined this happening so quickly.

Well, this was at the time where the Twins were shuffling pitchers up and down because of the wear on the bullpen so he pitched 4 innings and allowed 6 hits but no runs & no walks and he struck out 3. He was optioned back down to AAA a week later when the Twins activated RHP Michael Pineda from the 10-Day Injured List. He made 2 starts and was called up again on August 27th and has been pitching very well since then.

So…you can easily see why, at the time in 2017, Randy and his wife-to-be, Aerial, thought there would be no problem with scheduling the wedding on the 28th of September. All minor-league teams are done by then so it was a relatively safe pick but….Pitch Happens!!!

Maybe the Twins should put him in their marketing department, too He’s had 3 big promotions already this season, 5 if you count all of them.

I tried to find out if the Twins did anything to help his development because he’s been a better pitcher this year compared to 2018 and that’s hard to do, pitch better against better competition. All I could find was a tweet about them simplifying his repertoire:

If they’re wondering what to be for Halloween, that Dobnak mustache seems to work well with a Wedding Pitcher theme, don’t you think?

CONGRATS, Randy & Aerial! This is an Awesome story!

Since they are getting so much publicity including some of the things on their gift registry, Aerial posted about it and created a donation site to St. Jude Hospital.

Do you have to have the Twins game on at all times somewhere during the wedding and the reception? Haha!

Here are the pages I used to research & write this article if you’re interested:
2019 Pitching Log

Randy Dobnak’s College & Minor League Stats

Randy’s MLB Player Page for all of his Transactions or, as I like to call them, Twinsactions

Did you like this? Share it:
Posted in Baseball News and Happenings, Minnesota Twins, Minor League Affilliates, Transactions | Leave a comment