Nightly Notes: Game #77

Things looked bad early, but the Twins escaped this series against the Blue Jays with a series split, which is really all you can ask for in a 4 game series. Here are tonight's notes:

1.) It looked like tonight was going to be one Carlos Silva's patented bombs, which he throws out every 4th or 5th start. He gave up 4 runs in the first, including a bomb by Frank Thomas (in case you somehow hadn't heard, that was Thomas' 500th career blast). After that, however, Silva settled down nicely -- he gave up a 5th run in the 3rd inning, but ended up going 7 innings. For the last 4 of those innings, Silva looked really good (from what I hear -- sadly, I couldn't watch today). What's unusual about this is that Silva, to my recollection, doesn't usually recover mid-game -- but he buckled down nicely tonight to get his 6th win.

2.) Juan Rincon and Joe Nathan contributed for 2 innings of perfect relief. Not much else to say here, other than having a good bullpen is nice -- and if Juan Rincon can slot himself back in as a part of that "solid" core group of players, then the Twins bullpen will be that much better off. I think he still can be an effective pitcher, so we'll see.

3.) Bad things first: Luis Rodriguez (.169 now) has GOT to be sent down (I'm posting on the Matt Garza call-up in a separate post, but let me just say here that Matt Tolbert should have been joining him). Nick Punto -- .215 (ouch). I really believed that Punto would turn it around and start hitting again -- doesn't look like that's going to happen.

4.) Now, for the good. Jason Tyner has not been nearly the player this year that he was last year -- but today he went 3-for-4, scored 2 runs and drove one in. That means he's now hitting .291 on the season -- and it's hard to criticize that.

5.) Nice to see Justin Morneau back in the lineup -- not so nice to see him and Joe Mauer go a combined 0-for-7 (with Morneau leaving 3 on base, and Mauer leaving FOUR on base).

6.) Torii Hunter is the man -- more fodder for the argument that he needs to be re-signed.

7.) Jason Bartlett hitting second looks like it might just work. Unlike some of you out there, I actually prefer to have Mauer hitting third. With Castillo leading off, and another speedy guy like Bartlett behind him (if he keeps hitting -- 2-for-3 today), I think the Twins lineup balances fairly effectively.

8.) Jacque Jones would have been a good pickup if the Twins could have gotten the deal that the Marlins almost had, with the Cubs agreeing to pick up nearly all of Jones salary over the next two years. He's not the player he was when he originally left the Twins, but he'd fill a need and he doesn't have nearly the character problems that Milton Bradley has. I think the Twins should still look into the possibility of getting him, but by no means should they overpay.