How good is this team?
Twins Hall of Fame manager Tom Kelly was one of many old-school baseball observers who used to say that you needed to wait until Memorial Day to know what kind of team you had. Usually a club has played about one-third of its games by the end of May. That’s been pushed back to the first week of June this season with the late start to the campaign. But we’re here, (one game shy of the 54-game mark) so it’s fair to ask - how good are the 2022 Minnesota Twins?
The answer? Well, that’s complicated.
Back on May 24, the Twins were 27-16 (.628), on pace to win 102 games. And while no sensible observer expected them to continue to win at that pace, the club found itself in the midst of a month-long stretch of games against sub-par teams. So there was an opportunity to bank a bunch of wins, jump out to a large lead in the relatively weak AL Central and cement their status as a playoff contender.
Eight days later, the Twins have won just three more games and now stand at 30-23, .566, still in first place in the AL Central, but having squandered that opportunity by dropping seven of their last 10 against the woeful Royals and Tigers. And after squandering that opportunity, now comes the tough stretch - three games each in Toronto, and at home versus the Yankees and Rays.
Clearly the Twins are not a 102-win team. But they’re also not a .300 team either. So at the end of 162 games where are they likely to reside on that spectrum?
When the season started, I had them in the mid-80’s for wins. That was based on confidence in their offensive potential and an utter dearth of conviction in their pitching potential.
After 53 games, the offense is good, especially relative to the rest of baseball where offense is decidedly lacking. And while the pitching has exceeded expectations, it has done so dancing on the edge of a cliff. And with Chris Paddack lost for the year, Sonny Gray back on the IL, and Joe Ryan having COVID, they’re perilously close to falling over that edge.
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So how good are they? The truth is, we don’t really know. Given the injuries, the uncertain pitching, and now a few days on the sidelines for unvaccinated players, it’s difficult to read too much into any of the results they’ve achieved so far this season.
What we can say with a fair bit of certainty is that they reside in the worst division in all of baseball, and will have plenty more games to make hay against Cleveland, Detroit and Kansas City. What we can’t say is if they’ll have all their players healthy and ready to go when they do. We also don’t know what - if any - additions they might make come trade deadline time.
If they are able to get healthy, and maybe add a piece or two, I might revise my win prediction upwards to between 85 and 90. And that ought to be good enough to win the AL Central and get you into the playoffs. But as we’ve seen for 18 straight Twins playoff games, you don’t face Cleveland, Detroit and Kansas City in the postseason. So unless they’re 100% healthy and they add a frontline starter at the deadline, they’ll be right back to dancing on the edge of that cliff.
How good are the Twins?
I fear the answer is: good enough to make the playoffs, and unfortunately extend that record-setting postseason losing streak.
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