After the Minnesota Twins as a team and a middle infield found success in 2017, can that duo make our all-time middle infield list?
The Minnesota Twins have built a history that is filled with plenty of success, headlined by World Series victories in 1987 and 1991. Of course, there are plenty of seasons we would like to forget as well. Throughout this series we are exploring something that is hopefully fun to look back on as a Twins fan, the best of each of the position groups through Twins history. The next group up in the series are the middle infielders.
Unfortunately for the past decade or so of Twins baseball, we have often observed some less than stellar middle infields. Several of those middle infields we have experienced have been downright frustrating. A lot of the reason for that frustration begins and ends with the revolving door at shortstop in recent memory. In fact, 2018 may mark the second time since 2005 that the Twins will have the same Opening Day shortstop as they did the previous year. (Please, please baseball gods don’t turn this into a jinx!)
To get the full feel for what that has been like here is the list of opening day shortstops from 2005 through 2017.
- 2005: Jason Bartlett
- 2006: Juan Castro
- 2007: Jason Bartlett
- 2008: Adam Everett
- 2009: Nick Punto
- 2010: J.J. Hardy
- 2011: Alexi Casilla
- 2012: Jamey Carroll
- 2013: Pedro Florimon
- 2014: Pedro Florimon
- 2015: Danny Santana
- 2016: Eduardo Escobar
- 2017: Jorge Polanco
The funny and depressing thing about that list is, as a fan there was plenty of hope sold at each player. Some were veterans who were supposed to buy time for some unknown young shortstop to bust through. At other stops, there was a young guy who was supposed to be the hope of the future. Most notably it may have been Jason Bartlett before he was packaged with Matt Garza and sent to Tampa Bay for Delmon Young.
As the Twins now sit with Polanco as the near term answer to the shortstop position next to the slugging Brian Dozier, we can look back at the middle infields of the past with some optimism about what is to come. That is even before thinking of guys like Nick Gordon, Wander Javier, and Royce Lewis who will be providing more hope as they climb through the minors.
As we go through this list, WAR will provide the basis for a lot of decision on where some of these tandems land. There will also be some other evaluations made or else this list could very well be dominated by two or three of the best Twins middle infielders. Lets get started with the duo that landed at number five on our list.