12/21/24
October 10, 2010
Yankees Crush Twins in Three-Game Sweep: The New York Yankees continued their postseason mastery of the Minnesota Twins, completing a three-game sweep in the first round of the American League playoffs with a 6-1 win Saturday night at home. The Twins have lost nine consecutive postseason games to the Yankees and 12 overall, the second longest playoff losing streak in MLB history. "The Twins embarrassed themselves in front of the nation this week," writes Minneapolis Star-Tribune sports columnist Jim Souhan. Another Minnesotan had a gentler response. "It's all redeemed by the fact that we're in the midst of this glorious fall here in Minnesota that just makes everything golden," said Garrison Keillor.
While it would be easy to whine about the Twins missing Morneau and Nathan, they have got to play better ball in the post season if they want to break this streak.
Mauer and Kubel combine for a whopping zero RBI's and bat .150. They go 2 for 18 with runners in scoring position, and only one of those hits actually scored a run. Hard to compete with the Yankees if you produce those kind of numbers.
Gardenhire is a very good manager, but at what point is he held accountable for not being able to get his team past the 1st round of the playoffs? They ought to at least be respectable in the playoffs...0 for 12 is not respectable.
posted by dviking at 12:47 PM on October 10, 2010
I'm not sure how much you can blame Gardenhire. He plays with the players he's given. The twins are a nice team, but their pitching isn't dominant and their offense isn't good enough to make up the difference. The yankee lineup is deeper 1-9.
In a short series, it shows.
The Twins are a nice team. Fine organization. Great fans. Sound fundamentals. But do we really want to see them in another postseason with the same kind of strike-throwing, pitch-to-contact pitching philosophy? These guys are baseball's Boise State. Easy to root for, fine inside the AL Central, but they're not major conference timber.
Minnesota's wipeout against New York and its potent lineup was entirely predictable. The Twins have a below-average staff when it comes to getting swings and misses and getting strikeouts, quick barometers of how to measure up against good hitting teams in October.
In losing 12 straight postseason games, the Twins' starters have averaged only 5.7 strikeouts per nine innings -- about 15 percent worse than all teams averaged this regular season. The franchise hasn't had a starter punch out 10 batters in a postseason game since Walter Johnson in 1925, when it played out of Washington as the Senators.
The twins second game starter was pavano, unwanted in NY. The twins needed to click on all cylinders and hope the Yankees faltered. Neither happened.
posted by justgary at 05:51 PM on October 10, 2010
The franchise hasn't had a starter punch out 10 batters in a postseason game since Walter Johnson in 1925, when it played out of Washington as the Senators.
Considering they had Santana this decade and won the World series in '87 and in the 90s, that piece of criticism seems out of place. The other points I can see though.
posted by jmd82 at 07:51 PM on October 10, 2010
I don't really see how the matchup can be said to be "not competitive". You're talking about the three teams that came out on top of their divisions over a long season, plus the second-place team with the best win-loss record. The only possible explanation for any matchup in the division playoffs not being competitive is if one division just sucks, top to bottom. Do you think that's the case here?
posted by lil_brown_bat at 09:02 PM on October 10, 2010
I'm not sure how much you can blame Gardenhire. He plays with the players he's given
While I agree with that on some level, I have to think that Gardenhire is involved in personnel decisions, and he's certainly involved with the overall game strategy used by the Twins. As your link stated the Twins have a strike-throwing, pitch-to-contact pitching philosophy, which serves them well over the long haul of a season, but is a liabiltiy in a 5 game series. In the '87 and '91 series we had guys like Viola, Erickson, Blyleven, Morris, and a decent closer in Reardon. Tom Kelly put together those teams, or was at least involved with them. So, maybe the Twins need to get rid the GM, maybe it's the pitching coach, maybe it's Gardenhire, maybe all of them. It would be foolish to continue with the same game management philosophy and expect a different outcome.
posted by dviking at 10:48 PM on October 10, 2010
I think there's a lot of ways to analyse it, but I think the simple truth is the Twins didn't have it's starters perform well enough to win. Some times, it's not about personnel, or managerial decisions, it's about performance when it matters. Twins shat the bed.
If the Yankees face the Rangers, I think that will be more competitive given the lefties the Rangers can throw at them.
posted by WeedyMcSmokey at 11:48 PM on October 10, 2010
Given that Cliff Lee will be unavailable until game 3 or 4 of a potential Rangers/Yankees series, it could get ugly.
posted by rcade at 10:29 AM on October 11, 2010
You're talking about the three teams that came out on top of their divisions over a long season, plus the second-place team with the best win-loss record.
I don't believe the regular season is all that comparable to the post season. Over 162 games a 10 game difference can make the difference between a great year and disappointing one. The Yankees didn't have to win 120 games, they simply had to make the payoffs. So they rested Arod and gave Pettitte plenty of time to recuperate.
In a short series the Yankees are holding nothing back, and they're in a different class than the twins. Any chance of the Twins pulling the upset were dependent on playing almost perfect baseball, and at times they looked like the bad news bears (especially game 3).
Domination is more subtle in baseball than other sports. Maybe calling it 'not competitive' is a stretch. But at no time, other than early in game 1, did I ever get the feeling the Twins had a chance.
The Phils held the Reds to 4 runs. The Twins scored a grand total of 7. Not the same level of dominance, but not all that much more competitive either.
posted by justgary at 02:44 PM on October 11, 2010
In a series like this, not having fan loyalty to either club, I would almost always side with the smaller market team, doing more with less, etc.
I'd like to see this matchup be competitive at some point. I feel bad for the Twins' continued early exits. They need to have a 1955 Dodgers moment.