It was more of the same for Jose Berrios and the Minnesota Twins on Thursday afternoon, as the rookie right-hander dug too deep of a hole for the offense to dig out of in an 8-5 loss to the Detroit Tigers at Target Field.
The loss was the Twins’ seventh in a row, dropping their overall record to 49-78.
About the only positive for Berrios on the day was that his season ERA went down, despite allowing five earned runs in as many innings with three strikeouts and five walks. Berrios’ ERA dropped from 9.28 to 9.24 as the Tigers secured a sweep, and sent the Twins further into a tailspin that takes them next to Toronto to face the Blue Jays.
Robbie Grossman, Max Kepler and Miguel Sano had multi-hit games for a Twins offense that made it marginally interesting in the eighth inning against Kyle Ryan and Justin Wilson efore Francisco Rodriguez slammed the door shut for his 35th save of the year — which ranks second to Baltimore’s Zach Britton among AL closers.
Here’s what I saw from my seat:
Here today, gone tomorrow
Following the game, Berrios and fellow starter Tyler Duffey were shipped back to Triple-A Rochester. Andrew Albers will join the team in his native Canada, ironically, and the Twins will make one more move prior to Friday’s game. It’s anyone’s guess who it’ll be, though a pitcher seems likely. The Twins sent out Kennys Vargas to add a — usually superfluous — 13th pitcher, but with the worst starting rotation in MLB, it’s hard to say that Paul Molitor hasn’t needed each of his relievers with a rash of short starts recently.
And while the team sent out two of the primary culprits in that respect, there’s no guarantee Pat Dean — who’ll start Friday in Toronto against #OldFriend Francisco Liriano — will be any better, and the same goes for Albers. Albers will take one of the rotation spots, and Molitor suggested he still wasn’t positive which direction the club would go with the other. There’s a chance Hector Santiago, who is having his Friday start skipped with a thumb issue, could come back on Monday with a little added rest, Molitor said after Thursday’s game.
For the most part, Berrios was kind of a disaster
…and frankly, based on some of Berrios’ sequences, this game could have been even worse. The old adage in baseball is that the best pitch is strike one, and it’s true for pitchers young and old, seasoned or otherwise. After 1-0 counts this year, American League batters have combined to hit .271/.378/.462 — an .840 OPS that loosely translated to how good guys like Bryce Harper and Ben Zobrist have been this season. After 0-1, that mark falls to .228/.268/.359 — an OPS of .627. That’s pretty much like what Danny Santana has done for the Twins this season.
Berrios routinely fell behind batters all day Thursday, and it started early. Perhaps the best indication that it wasn’t going to be a good day was when he walked No. 2 hitter Tyler Collins — who entered hitting just .214/.270/.379 — on five pitches in front of Miguel Cabrera in the first inning. Cabrera also walked on five pitches before Berrios regrouped to get Victor Martinez to fly out to left and J.D. Martinez to strike out on three pitches.
J.D. Martinez had a rough day, by the way, as he went 0-for-5 while seeing just 15 pitches.
Berrios let up three runs in the second inning, and it started with a five-pitch walk to Justin Upton, who promptly stole second with a walking lead on a 1-2 pitch. It wasn’t all Berrios’ fault in the second, however. James McCann singled to put runners on the corners, and Andrew Romine hit a rocket that Brian Dozier dove to his left to corral. It was an impressive physical play, but Dozier’s throw to Jorge Polanco at second to try start an inning-ending double play was way, way off and ended up in short left field. Both runners moved up, and Ian Kinsler drove them both in two pitches later with a double to left-center.
The third inning was more of the same, as the Tigers yet again put up three runs on Berrios. This time, Victor Martinez singled through the shift and Casey McGehee added an infield single before McCann absolutely unloaded on a bomb to the flower pots just to the right of the batter’s eye to cap the scoring on the day against Berrios.
Twins PR estimated the McCann homer at 427 feet.
McCann terrorized Berrios
McCann had a single, home run and double all before the fifth inning was over, then promptly grounded into a 6-4-3 double play the second he had to face someone else — in this case, Taylor Rogers in the seventh inning. McCann added a fourth hit in the ninth — a single off J.T. Chargois — for the first four-hit game of his career. Ironically, McCann came into the game hitting just .212/.267/.360 — nearly identical to Collins’ line.
Mr. Santana had an interesting day, at least as far as 0-for-4 games go
Danny went 0-for-4 — all by virtue of groundouts to Kinsler. It was kind of humorous in a way, as Santana ran three-ball counts in each of the first two plate appearances with nearly identical results. So in the third plate appearance, he ambushed the first pitch — for the exact same result. And then in the ninth inning against K-Rod, Danny worked the count to 3-1….and grounded out to Kinsler for the second out of the inning.
Norris was fantastic for the Tigers
It was evident pretty early too, as he limited damage in the first and second innings — one single in each inning — but he really picked up steam as his offense did as well. Between the last out in the second all the way through the first out in the sixth — the third of Santana’s four 4-3’s — Norris set down 11 Twins batters in a row. Norris got through the rest of the sixth while allowing just Dozier — who had doubled to left to break the string of batters set down — to score on a Grossman single, and went back out for the seventh before he was chased following a Sano double and an Eduardo Escobar RBI single to left.
All told, Norris gave the Tigers 6.1 strong innings with a pair of earned runs, five strikeouts and no walks. For a guy who — like Berrios — had experienced issues going deep into games, he did a fine job. He pounded the strike zone as well, with 61-of-93 pitches going for strikes (65.6 percent).
Polanco and Grossman had a scary collision in the third inning
With two out in the third inning, Romine lifted a fly ball to the Bermuda Triangle area between short and left. Polanco raced out and Grossman raced in, with Polanco making the catch and also taking the brunt of what appeared to be Grossman’s elbow to the head. Polanco stayed down for a while before popping up to his feet, but in true baseball fashion he not only had to bat in the next half inning — hit flew out to deep left — but also had to field a grounder off the bat of Kinsler on the first pitch thrown the next inning. Another baseball adage was in play there: the ball will find you. But for the most part it looked like Polanco came away just fine.
Humorously, an identical situation presented itself in Romine’s next at-bat to end the fifth inning. This time, Polanco absolutely bailed out, hitting the deck in front of Grossman who made the catch for the final out of the inning.
Michael Tonkin struggled — again
His inning started with Kinsler getting drilled on the first pitch, followed by a seven-pitch walk to Collins — who surprisingly drew three walks on the day. Collins had just seven walks all season in 111 plate appearances coming into the game. Anyway, with Kinsler and Collins on base, Tonkin managed to get a fly out off the bat of Cabrera on a 1-0 pitch before Victor Martinez hammered a two-run double to left-center. That was the only hit Tonkin allowed, but it wound up being a big one.
Again, it’s worth wondering if Tonkin is just running on fumes at this point. This was his 10th appearance in August, and he’s made 10 or more appearances in every month this season. In his previous nine August appearances, he had a 6.10 ERA and a .988 OPS against. With 62 innings pitched coming into Thursday’s game, Tonkin ranked 14th among MLB relievers in innings pitched.
Brandon Kintzler got a little work in the eighth inning
Such is the life of a closer on a seven-game losing streak, as Kintzler hadn’t worked since Aug. 21, and hasn’t entered in a save situation since Aug. 16 — a nine-day span. Kintzler dropped his season ERA to 1.73 with the scoreless inning. It’s surprising he wouldn’t have garnered more interest on the August trade market even as a middle reliever, but it’s also possible the Twins would prefer to keep him around with one more year of control before he’s eligible for free agency.
Unfortunately, based on where the Tigers were in the order in the eighth, we didn’t get a Kintzler vs. Kinsler matchup.
The Twins made it interesting — kind of — in the eighth
With the Tigers leading 8-2 and reliever Kyle Ryan out for a second inning of work, the Twins piece together a bit of a rally. After Dozier grounded to short, Polanco roped a triple to right-center and scored on a Grossman groundout. Trevor Plouffe followed with a four-pitch walk and Sano hit his second double of the day to put runners on second and third. The Tigers countered by bringing left-handed reliever Justin Wilson in to face Kepler, who responded beautifully by working a full count before drilling a 3-2, 96 mph fastball off the fence in right center to bring home both runners.
Wilson hasn’t had the greatest of seasons (4.28 ERA/2.82 FIP/10.6 K/9), but he’s got tremendous stuff and has a 20-1 K/BB ratio against left-handed hitters this year, making Kepler’s plate appearance all the more impressive. Unfortunately, Escobar flew out to Collins in center to end the threat, leaving the tying run on deck.
Chargois snapped a dubious streak in his inning of work
Chargois fanned Upton — the first batter he faced in the ninth — swinging after falling behind 2-0. That snapped a string of five straight appearances in which Chargois had failed to strike out a batter. After starting Upton with four straight heaters between 94-96 mph, Chargois finished him off with an 88 mph slider for the first out.
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Notes & Quotes
- The Twins announced during the game that Byungho Park had undergone successful season-ending surgery with Dr. Thomas Varecka. Park had a tendon in his right middle finger repaired, and will start rehab in Minneapolis soon.
- Kepler’s double in the eighth drove in his 54th and 55th runs of the season — tops among AL rookies.
- Sano’s doubles marked his first extra-base hits since a second inning home run against Kansas City’s Yordano Ventura on Aug. 12. Sano was hitless on the last road trip.
- Berrios on the demotion: “I was surprised, but I do understand the decision. I do understand they want me to go down there and gain more confidence in what I’m doing, but I do understand.”
- Berrios on if he feels a couple starts in Rochester will allow him to come back and help the team in September: “Yes of course. I want to take advantage of my starts down there and do whatever I can to get back up here.”
- Berrios on if he takes any positives from getting through five innings after a rough second and third inning: “I think I finished strong. I think I got better as I went on. The first few innings were bad, but I think I finished strong.”
- Berrios on if he may be thinking too much on the mound about his mechanics: “No, not really. When I’m out there, I look at what pitch is called, where the catcher sets up his glove and that’s it. I’m just focused on throwing the ball; I’m not focused on mechanics on the mound.”
- Berrios on if Upton steal was indicative of him locking in too much on the hitter: “No. I always do try to keep runners close and help the catcher in that aspect. But, at that point I don’t think it was because I was concentrating on something else, it was just something that happened.”
- Berrios on issuing five walks on Thursday afternoon: “Right now I don’t think about the walks or anything. I just try to go out there and compete and throw hard. If I miss, I miss hard. That’s what I did today. It was five walks, but the walks aren’t the thing that bother me the most, but how I’m missing my spots and how I’m not doing what I’m supposed to be doing.”
- Molitor on if Berrios made some progress late after a rocky start: “I think you do look for positives. That fourth and fifth inning….first of all to get through those when we needed him to…I thought the fifth inning was one of the better innings that he’s had here — at least recently. I just feel that some of the things that we feel he needs to continue to try to improve upon mechanically — and some of the mental things too — just get fast on him. He has a tendency to revert back when he’s out there.”
- Molitor on if Berrios has remained upbeat despite his MLB struggles: “I think externally he has. I think he’s learned how to present himself in a way that shows that he’s a smart young man who is absorbing and trying to apply it. He’s taking the good with the bad, and learning from both. But my guess is that with young players struggling up here, it takes its toll.”
