It’s a familiar story for the Twins. The franchise has suffered some lengthy power droughts before. From 1988 through 2005, while the rest of MLB was enjoying a steroid-fueled home run rampage, no Twin managed to hit 30 or more home runs in a season. By contrast, the division rival Indians had 23, 30 homer seasons, and the 2000 Blue Jays alone had four hitters accomplish the feat (Carlos Delgado, Tony Batista, Brad Fulmer, and Jose Cruz). The Twins’ drought ended when Justin Morneau and Torii Hunter topped 30 in 2006, but there still hasn’t been a 35 home run season in Minnesota since 1970. That was the Milwaukee Brewers’ first year of existence, and the Brew Crew has produced  a dozen 35 home run campaigns.

And the Minnesota homer total may drop even further in the near future. Michael Cuddyer led the team with 20 longballs, but he is a free agent this offseason. Jason Kubel, who hit a career high of 28 in 2009, chipped in 12 this year. He’s likely to depart as well. Jim Thome and Delmon Young are already gone. All together, the departures subtract 45 roundtrippers, or 43% of the already pitiful team total. The only proven power threat who remains on the team’s roster is Justin Morneau, and given Morneau’s health situation, the Twins would be foolish to assume that he’ll carry the team with his bat in 2012. (more…)

Their early season performance was ugly. Game after game, the Twins were outhit, outpitched, and outfielded. In April, terrible hitting and constant early defecits sucked all the enjoyment out of nearly every game. In May, as the bullpen blew 10 games, every shred of hope was overshadowed by the fear that the Twins would find another way to lose. In fact, during April and May, the only people who could have found Twins games enjoyable (aside from opposing fans) were doctors who specialize in catastrophic sports injuries.

But now it is June, this team is actually managing to entertain people who like baseball. And it isn’t just because they are winning games (though that certainly helps). The Twins have rediscovered their roots as the scrappy underdog team that overachieves. They are “doing things the Twins way,” playing small ball, avoiding mistakes, and flawlessly executing the fundamentals of the game, for the first time in years. (more…)