MINNEAPOLIS — Earlier this week, Twins manager Rocco Baldelli admitted his team is playing in a new reality. Once the home run-record holding ‘Bomba Squad’, the 2022 Twins, with offense down across the league, have traded their big sticks and brute force for timely singles and stingy pitching.
The death-by-a-thousand-paper-cuts approach that has been required across the Majors this season — one that has made Minnesota successful — inherently requires consistent precision. The stacking of good at-bats leading to runs. Quality pitches followed by sound defense. Repeated over and over. If all packaged together, wins follow.
But Saturday’s 7-3 loss to the Royals illustrated the other side of that style of play. Lackluster execution, untimely mistakes and brief lapses of focus exposed the team.
Minnesota had moments of each, from a Jorge Polanco error with two outs in the fourth inning that led to two more runs to several two-out rallies that came up one hit short from results.
“We could’ve done a better job with some of it, whether it was how we were throwing the ball or defending,” Twins manager Rocco Baldelli said. “I think it wasn’t necessarily the cleanest game that we had.”
The good news is if the 46 previous games are any indication, Saturday is more of an outlier than a trend.
Exhibit A: Archer
Entering the game, Chris Archer had allowed just three hits — all singles — in 27 at-bats with runners in scoring position. He allowed three such…