Ugh, that wasn't pretty to watch.
The mistake-prone Twins were walked off 5-2 on Wednesday by Cleveland and need to win Thursday's afternoon game to earn a split of the four-game series.
That was walkoff loss No. 11.
"They've come in a lot of different fashions," Twins manager Paul Molitor said. "Probably at least half have been home runs. But there's been other things that have caused us to walk off with a loss. It's just kind of the nature of the game when you're on the road playing close games as we seem to. There just hasn't been a lot of separations in a lot of these games and it just comes down to the last couple of innings and you find yourself in that predicament. It has been a part of the storyline of the season."
As ugly as Wednesday's game was, Thursday's potentially could be quite entertaining.
The Twins will send Jose Berrios to the mound opposite of former Cy Young winner Corey Kluber - who's coming off his seventh complete game shutout on Saturday. He's had some hiccups this season but he's still 14-6 with a 2.63 ERA. Judging by his last outing, the Klubot is back.
Berrios will be making his first start of the season at Progressive Field. He's 2-0 with a 2.63 ERA in two career starts at Progressive Field. He's also 7-0 against AL Central opponents this season.
So this series, in which the Twins have looked awful in two games, can still be tied after tomorrow. Provided that Berrios is up for the challenge.
And the Twins can score more than two runs.
And the Twins can make fewer than 19 mistakes.
UPDATES
Twins manager Paul Molitor has been trying to find a day to rest Joe Mauer and settled on today. The timing seems odd because the Twins could split the series and Mauer is batting .296 against Kluber. But Molitor pointed out Mauer's 13 strikeouts against Kluber as one reason. If the Twins were still in the race, I bet Mauer at least DH's today.
Robbie Grossman will join the Twins in Detroit to continue his rehab from a strained hamstring. Part of the reason is that Target Field is set up for the Zack Brown concert.
Byron Buxton was scheduled to take batting practice today as he works his way back from a left wrist injury.
Aaron Slegers has had setback in his recovery from a sore shoulder and, "is back to square one," Molitor said.
When asked about how his team has bounced back from walkoff losses, Molitor said: "I don't know exactly our record after the 11 walkoffs and those type of things." Well the Twins are 2-8 after the walkoff losses, and they have Kluber today. But Molitor has not seen a hangover effect following the tough losses. "But what I do know is that this team has done good job of playing, as far as effort and energy and all those types of things I think we have sustained it pretty well and through some very adverse conditions at times, whether you want to talk about adverse losses or some of the things you went through at the deadline," he said. "I think we have been coming out and playing the game well."
