Francisco Liriano was almost as disappointing as Nelson Liriano. There has been a disquieting wave of injuries—to Michael Cuddyer, Kevin Slowey, Adam Everett, Scott Baker, Nick Punto, and, most depressingly, to Pat Neshek.
The offense has been erratic; the power and team on base percentage alarming. Up and down the lineup the new additions—and there are scads of new additions—have been underperforming at the plate. The bullpen has been as shaky as it's been in years, and seems ill equipped to absorb the Neshek blow.
On paper, certainly, the Twins appear to be a team with all sorts of concerns, and so far almost any close scrutiny of the stats would seem to bear that out.
And yet—at this point, at least—every team should have such concerns.
The question, of course, is how the hell are the Twins doing it? How the hell do they even hang with a team like the Red Sox, let alone take three-of-four from the most powerful, most multi-dimensionally talented team in the universe? How has a team that has allowed more runs than it has scored, and that is thirteenth out of fourteen AL teams in both homeruns and OBP, managed to grind its way to twenty wins and first place in the Central?
That's a damn good question, and I'm not sure I have an answer for you. It might well be a fluke. The Twins have handled the Central so far (at a 13-8 clip), and they've been pretty dominant at home (14-7). Where things get a bit worrisome is in the team's numbers with runners in scoring position (.311 BA, .371 OBP, and .452 SLG) and runners in scoring position with two outs (.315, .376, and .420). In a freakish season (or in the case of a freakishly good hitter), an individual might sustain those sorts of numbers over 162 games, but you pretty much expect that they'll eventually level out for the team and be more reflective of their overall performance, which so far hasn't been terrific, to say the least. A small ball team in today's American League pretty much has to have a dominant pitching staff. They certainly can't expect to lead the league in homers allowed and live to drink champagne in the post season.
The Minnesota pitching staff, from the starters to the bullpen, has been gutsy. It's been crafty. It's battled and pitched in and out of jams and, on the nights the Twins have won, generally been just good enough. There hasn't, though, been the domination we came to expect from Johan Santana every five days, and, in recent years, from the back end of the pen. Joe Nathan has been (mostly) his usual stout self, but with Neshek sidelined there's a level of pressure—and right now it sort of still feels like desperation—that we're unaccustomed to feeling in the late innings. Is anyone yet feeling entirely comfortable with any of our seventh- and eighth-inning options? If we're going to have to start extending guys like Rincon, Reyes, and Crain (all of whom have battled arm problems) what kind of trouble are we potentially looking at or asking for?
I fully realize that at this point that's just typical neurosis, but given what's transpired thus far it also sort of feels like unpardonable gratitude, so like everybody else I'll just wait and see and hope.
The division has obviously been a bit of a mystery in the early going, and everybody seems to be battling some problem or another. I've said previously that I think the Detroit Tigers are facing a constellation of problems that are going to bedevil them the rest of the way, and I still believe that. They obviously have the potential to put up outrageous offensive numbers, but they've been up and down, and their starting pitching has been putting them in a hole night after night; if I'm not mistaken, twelve of their sixteen wins have been come-from-behind affairs, and that shit will wear on even the best offense.
The White Sox? Can't stand them, and I expect them to be as erratic as their manager all season (if Ozzie doesn't get fired).
The team that's been lurking in the weeds for the first six weeks—and, actually, they've just started lumbering ashore and shaking off the milfoil—is the Cleveland Indians. As exciting and unexpected as the Twins' performance has been, am I alone in feeling more than a little bit queasy about the fact that, even after taking three-of-four from Boston, our local nine still finds itself with just a game-and-a-half cushion?
Finally, for all of us Jason Kubel fans—and there must be at least a couple dozen of us out here—is it time to shut up and accept that our pet project is entering Rich Becker territory? I suspect we may have no choice if Craig Monroe continues to energize the team with his offense and take away Kubel's at bats. And after watching Monroe the last week I'm prepared to admit that I was probably wrong about him, provided, of course, that he continues to prove me wrong. Which, since I really am a fan, would make me nothing but happy.
"Lumbering ashore and shaking off the millfoil?" HA! But seriously, I'm with you on the Indians - anyone catch Cabrera's triple play Monday night?
How come you don't write in your blog anymore? I miss your stories.
so do i! yo ivanhoe, come back!
Let the man pursue sanity on his own terms. Vultures.
Brad, I share your absolute bewilderment at this club, but it's fun right now, so let's both enjoy it.
but what about OUR sanity? some of us have been ivanhoe lurkers for years. we count on the man and his posts. baseball's great but give me my ivanhoe!
"It had become just another shit job. That was all there was to it. He had become an indifferent and exhausted practitioner of a profession he had once pursued with genuine dignity and skill and a certain stoic pride."
Henry James?
"Jim was most ruined, for a servant, because he got so stuck up on account of having seen the devil and been rode by witches."
Ah-ha, It must be from "To kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee.
The best I can come up with is a parent review of Ivanhoe Elementary School in Los Angeles: "Your years at Ivanhoe will be happy. The community is very accepting." Which strikes me as something that you, Ivanhoe, should use in a blog, but not this blog, your other blog!
Ok, I got nothing to go on other than your hints. High school novel. Sports reference. It is a quote that has been paraphrased, albiet slightly mangled. I'll take another stab in the dark and say Holden Caulfied offers the quote in amongst his slang narration in "The Catcher in the Rye."
Is it "Battledore and Shuttlecock" by Gore Vidal?
I don't want to devalue the major prize that is at stake, but perhaps another hint might be forthcoming. Such as, which sport is being referenced and/or was the book one hundred years preceeding or after the Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Finally, was it a novel your were required to read in high school or one you just happened to read in high school.
Not that the answers to these questions will provide an illiterate such as myself who never has read Henry James and knows more about Mark David Chapman than J.D. Salinger with the ultimate answer, but dammit, now I am hooked. I don't care about the major prize I just hate to leave a problem unsolved. I should not be waking in the middle of the night wondering about such things when there are so many more puzzling dilemmas in the world, but I have been waking to thoughts of "Wha' fo' I write, yo Ivanhoe" instead of whether our economy has truly is out over the edge like wile coyote spinning his legs before the free fall. That should not be.
My next stab in the dark, although I have never read the book. A box of Wheaties in the grocery store. It is definitely a reference to sports in more ways than one. The author actually resembles Mark Twain and I think he was and is still popular with the younger crowd.
Breakfast of Champions by Kurt Vonnegut.
I'm with Andy B - Vonnegut's got to be it. It's been tormenting me as well.