It’s been a strange start to the season for the Minnesota Twins.
On the one hand the team is 2-1 and has looked really sharp in some key areas. Pablo Lopez was electric in his first start, Byron Buxton appears to be fully back, and the offense scored nine runs over the first two games.
However, the flip side is objectively brutal. Minnesota lost Royce Lewis for at least the first month of the season after he suffered a severe right quad strain on Opening Day, and finished the weekend by getting blown out 11-0.
Everything went wrong for the Twins on Sunday, from Bailey Ober getting rocked right out of the gate to the bats going concerningly quiet. Minnesota was up against Brady Singer, who isn’t really a world beating pitcher but looked utterly dominant against the Twins’ lineup.
It was a brutal way to end the first series of the season, and is something Rocco Baldelli had a hard time explaining after the game.
Rocco Baldelli tries to explain Twins brutal 11-0 loss to Royals
Speaking with the media following the game, Baldelli tried to explain what happened and seemed to be at a total loss.
”I can’t sit here and tell you I know what went wrong,” Baldelli said. “Overall it was a rough one, there’s just no way around that. It’s not a pleasant game to have to sit through or play through.”
One massive disappoint was the performance of Ober. He was excellent in Spring Training and pitched his way into a position where many believe he can help fill the void left by Sonny Gray. It’s only one start, but the low bar seems to be set at allowing eight runs on nine hits in less than two innings of work.
Rocco didn’t hang Ober out to dry, but he also didn’t go out of his way to brush the start off as merely early-season jitters.
“It’s not something I was expecting, obviously,” Baldelli said. “Some days you go out there and nothing you do, even when you do your job the way you want to, it doesn’t work out. Some day you’re also not sharp, and maybe there was a little bit of both here.”
"Overall, it was a rough one. There is no way around that."#MNTwins manager Rocco Baldelli after the loss to the Royals. pic.twitter.com/EUdCQVfmXX
— Bally Sports North (@BallySportsNOR) March 31, 2024
Perhaps more concerning is how quiet the Twins’ bats went in Sunday’s loss. Minnesota came into the game having outscored Kansas City 9-2 over the first two games of the series, but mustered up just four hits against Singer.
It doesn’t take much to remind Twins fans of how stagnant the offense got for large stretches of last season, and the outing on Sunday was eerily reminiscent of that. Again, it’s just one game and the Twins are going to have bad games this season but it was a little alarming to see the team take that massive of a step back after such a strong start.
Things can easily smooth out in the coming days, though. The Twins head up to Milwaukee for a two game series against the Brewers before heading to Target Field for the home opener against Cleveland.