Before I get into anything else, I want to go into injuries
and the head-scratching decision to keep players in the game after their
injuries. This happened many times during
the season and it really showed a lack of long term thinking. Toward the end of the year, it continued
where Torres, Edwin and Urshela were all injured and they decided to leave the players
in the game only to take them out an inning or two later. It made no sense and really bubbled up to me
when Torres had his leg buckle and he stretched his hamstring (it looks worse)
and they left him in the game??? You
take him out immediately and get it checked out. Urshela got his in the hand; you take him out
and ice that immediately; this was not a playoff game. With all the injuries, I have to question our
medical staff and they obviously deserve scrutiny; but I also think Boone needs
to lead and don’t let the player decide, you take them out! We missed over 2000 player games because of
injuries; that is absurd!
OK, on to the
playoffs.
First, the past doesn’t matter. I have heard people talk about how we handle the
Twins (we have won 13 of 15 postseason series), but none of that matters
now. I wish we were in a different place,
I had visions of Betances and Severino being some key pieces for us, but while
we have Severino, we lost German (our big winner) and Betances. We are still without Hicks who in many ways
was the hardest for us to replace and we will now hope that Gardner can keep
his magic going. We lose defense in CF
and depth and will need Maybin as well.
Didi has not swung the bat well and Urshela and DJ have cooled down. Voit goes into the postseason lost, Edwin
goes in cold and Sanchez combines both of those situations.
I don’t like how we are going in, but perhaps the rest will be good. We still have a ton of
talent and while everyone needs to step up (#NextManUp) it would be great if
Stanton can step up. He should be in a
pretty good place right now. Judge was
not swinging well either toward the end and he is a huge difference-maker for
us.
As for pitching, it was not pleasing to see Paxton leave his
last start with irritation in his left glute and because it will be col, that
is concerning; we need him! Everyone
else should be pretty good and our bullpen is incredibly deep. As I wrote before, we could give everyone an
inning or 2 and have nothing but excellent pitchers go through the 9 innings. Overall, our pitching is better than the
Twins, specifically our bullpen and that is our advantage.
Minnesota is great on the road, they were the only team to
win 50 games on the road this year and they won 55 (lost 26). They were actually better on the road than at
home. The Yankees won 57 at home to give
you some perspective and only two other teams had more wins at home than the Twins
had on the road.
These are two evenly matched teams and while I was
disappointed that we do not hold the record for most home runs in a season, we
are still very talented and even injured, very deep. Anything can happen in any series and just as
Houston may lose, so can we. The Twins
have a great lineup and they can hit all pitches, I was very impressed with
their team and their hitting approach.
Either team could win games by a lot and just looking at that 14-12 game
at Target Field as an example of how an 8-2 lead isn’t safe, yet it took a
diving catch by Hicks in CF to win that game.
It is a little silly to write,
but we have to play up to our capability and in my view if both teams do that,
we will win.
Now we just have to win 11 more games and we are champs. 11 more!
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