It was a series that featured two hot teams. New York who had won nine of their last twelve games & Minnesota who had won seventeen of their last twenty.
The New York Yankees have been the Minnesota Twins Achilles heel for a long time and unfortunately in this series it continued.
Twins starting pitching in this 3-game series gave up a combined 28 hits. Both Minnesota starters Chris Paddack (Game 1) & Pablo Lopez (Game 2) combined for 22 of those 28 hits. The lack of Twins offense was magnified with the lineup generating only 14 hits and 1 run in this series.
The Twins had opportunities, but could not string enough hits together to score runs. In this series, Minnesota had left twenty runners stranded on base and were 0 for 13 with runners in scoring position. Not a great recipe to get wins in this series or vs any opponent. In addition, no Twins player had a multi-hit game as well and the only run was a solo homerun by Ryan Jeffers.
The bright spot in this series was the Twins bullpen pitching better. It has been through some rough patches over the last few weeks. Jackson, Okert, & Funderburk (who have struggled) only allowed two runs in all 3 games. A big improvement that also helped build confidence in the players and manager Rocco Baldelli.
Minnesota’s schedule does not get any easier as they go on the road to face the American League Central leading Cleveland Guardians for a weekend series. It’s an early season matchup that could shake up the standings.