Here's how close are the Twins to being eliminated from the AL Wild Card race

With just four games left on their schedule, the Minnesota Twins are officially crossed the rubicon. There's almost no wiggle room left in terms of the mean being afforded a margin of error, as every game is a must-win in every sense from here on out.

That already should have been the case, but we all watched them fall asleep at the wheel on Tuesday against the Marlins in one of the most embarrassing losses of the season. The second-worst team in baseball marched into Target Field and beat the Twins 4-1, despite having a -223 run differential and the second-worst ERA in the league.

Minnesota bounced back on Wednesday but it reeked of being too little too late for a team that should have figured things out a month ago. Instead the Twins have been on an otherwise uninterrupted downward trajectory since mid-August. At one point they were 3.5 games away from controlling a first-round bye, but with four games left the Twins are two out from the final Wild Card spot.

This isn't because the AL suddenly got super competitive. While the Detroit Tigers have surged, the Twins fumbled the bag and coughed up control of their playoff ticket. It's looking increasingly unlikely to get punched, but the season isn't over yet.

How close are the Twins to being eliminated from the playoff picture?

Let's not tiptoe around it, things are absolutely dire for the Twins right now. Minnesota's playoff hopes are on life support and another loss will essentially eliminate all margin for error.

It won't however, fully eliminate the Twins.

There's still a distinctly clear path the playoffs, but it requires a ton of help. First and foremost the Twins need to win out, which would mean sweeping the Baltimore Orioles to finish the season. It's a home series, which plays to their favor, as the Twins are a sub-.500 team on the road this season.

That's bad news considering they'd need to go on the road to Houston for the Wild Card, but let's not get too far ahead of ourselves.

Even if the Twins do miraculously sweep the rest of the season, they'll need the Royals or Tigers to hit the skids. That's more likely to happen with Kansas City, as the Royals have a series against the Atlanta Braves to close out the season. It's one that the Braves need to win in order to clinch a playoff post, which plays into Minnesota's favor.

Wednesday's game between the Mets and Braves being postponed until Monday helps, because it means Chris Sale and Max Fried will face the Royals which further helps the Twins' cause. Detroit can still flame out and open a path for Minnesota to make the playoffs, but the Tigers play the White Sox so that feels unlikely to happen.

Nothing matters if the Twins don't take care of things on their end, though. We've reached reverse Magic Number territory -- which is two, by the way -- as fans are now looking at the standings to see how close Minnesota is to being eliminated rather than how close a playoff berth is.

The good news is that Twins can afford to lose Thursday night and not be eliminated. The bad news is that means another win by the Tigers and Royals shuts the door on any chance Minnesota has of making the playoffs.

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