Twins officially eliminated from playoffs, hand Wild Card to Royals after 7-2 loss to Orioles
The Tigers won earlier in the day, which means the Twins are officially eliminated from the playoffs.
A month ago the Minnesota Twins had a near 90 percent chance to make the playoffs, and were in the process of chasing down the Cleveland Guardians for the AL Central lead.
Just 40 days later their season came to an end without a playoff ticket in hand.
It's the end result of one of the worst collapses in recent memory. What the Twins did wasn't just embarrassing by their own standards, it's something that ranks among some of the most epic meltodwns in baseball history. Minnesota coughed up a lead in the AL Wild Card race that felt so inevitable from the start that it was hardly a surprise when it happened.
The Twins' playoff hopes officially getting dashed on Friday is almost anti-climactic but it means the terrible tumble is finally over. Minnesota will not be going to the playoffs, but the next few months will be spent sifting through the wreckage of their season and determining steps that need to be taken so something like this never happens again.
Twins have only themselves to blame for embarrassing collapse
What stings so much about the way the Twins collapsed is how much of a slow moving train it was. On August 18th they blew a late lead to teh Texas Rangers, which felt like a minor speed bump but was the beginning of a crack that eventually tore open the dam.
From that point on the Twins were consistently one of the worst teams in baseball. The bullpen had a WPA so bad that it was twice as terrible as the next closest team; an offense that had looked so hot in June froze up to the point where it couldn't hang with the likes of the Angels or Reds.
Injuries played a massive role as well, with Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton spending much of the month-long skid on the IL. Both returned before they were ready and they were instantly the two best players on the team even at less than 100 percent. Their absence and the team's struggle only further highlights how utterly dissapointing to was to see Royce Lewis' production and reliability fall off a cliff.
After saying he doesn't slump, Lewis hit .205/.267/.347 with just six home runs. He flat out let the Twins down when they needed his superstar swagger the most and it was a humbling on every single level.
Pitching was pretty abysmal too, something that wasn't helped by Joe Ryan and Brock Stewart suffering season-ending injuries. Those two losses ended up being massive, moreso than it seemed at first, but speaks to the core issue that led to this horrific collapse.
Ownership has been dragged through the mud all season by Twins fans, and rightfully so. The Pohlad's set a pathetic tone over the offseason when they slashed $30 million out of the payroll and didn't allow the front office to meaingfully add to the roster. This greed extended to the trade deadline where ownership reportedly wasn't interested in acquiring players with years left on their contracts, and was puncuated by a bad TV deal that made the team inaccessable to a large portion of the fan base for most of the season.
It's easy to blame the owners, but in the case of Twins fans they have a legitmate gripe. Attendance being down as a result of the poor product on the diamond will likely be held against fans by further cutting money out, and the situation is all around a total mess.
That's been the theme of Minnesota's season, though. It was an uphill battle from the start, and while this collapse is no doubt exaggerated it feels like the only way things could have ended.
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