I guess they were due for an embarrassing game, as they recovered so nicely from the ten game losing streak.
The Twins were absolutely destroyed by the Washington Nationals this afternoon, losing 7-0. Scott Diamond was not helped by his defense today, but he was still largely ineffective, giving up 10 hits and six earned runs. Even still, some of those runs should have been unearned, as the official scorer credited several Twins defensive miscues as hits by the Nationals. This is a stark contrast to my previous article, where I praised the Twins' proficiency defensively.
The game wasn't even out of reach until the fifth, however, as the Nationals used Diamond to score five runs in the fifth.
The offensive didn't help either, scoring zero runs, but the important difference here between the past few game is that no runner even got past second base.The Nationals even put five men on base for the Twins, with two errors and three walks, but they still could not buy a run.
The lineup manager Ron Gardenhire put out today was simply not designed to score many runs. Clete Thomas was batting second. SECOND. This is the guy who struck out 16 times in 28 at bats last year. Needless to say, Thomas went 0 for 4, and is batting .111 on the season. Chris Parmelee (2 for 3 with a walk) and Aaron Hicks (1 for 4) were the only Twins who got a hit.
In order to win the nightcap that starts at 6:05 Central Time tonight, Gardenhire needs to put together a better lineup with Joe Mauer and Josh Willingham in it.
With a pitcher like Nathan Karns (6.00 ERA, 1.67 WHIP) up for the Nationals, the Twins offense should be expected to put up more runs than the first two games combined. If they do, they can still take this series.
Samuel Deduno (2-1, 3.44 ERA) will pitch for the Twins.
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