When a couple weeks ago I asked another Twins fan if he thought the team might finish the season with a winning record, he asked whether I knew what rhymed with June. This past weekend, however, was more like a face plant than a swoon: four games against the (formerly) second-place Indians, four losses, the aggregate score of 28-8 computing neatly into a 7-2 average outcome. In other words, allowing a lot of runs while not scoring very many. Even before these last four sorry games, the Twins had on the season allowed 24 more runs than they'd scored, an oddity for a team in first place. It shows they'd been doing well in close games, but they haven't been playing any of those lately.
Another oddity concerns the team's home-road splits. In the American League, only the Houston Astros have a better record in road games (24-8) than the Twins (20-9). But in their home games the Twins have posted a woeful 14-24 mark. Possibly the Metrodome, being such a goofy place for baseball games, afforded the home team more of an advantage than does Target Field--like the way "local knowledge" is more helpful on a golf course featuring a million blind shots and hidden hazards.
But the best explanation for these oddities is probably that they're just statistical quirks arising from less than half a season of games having been played. In that case, "the real Twins" will start revealing themselves in tonight's game against the White Sox. Santana is pitching, Sano presumably will be in the 3-hole, and, though a "realist" might expect their overall record to slide toward their year-to-date run differential (-44, third worst in the American League), it's still undeniably June, the Twins are within a couple games of first place, and it looks like it'll be a nice evening for a ball game.
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