Play Ball! Minnesota Twins

Twins squads are in Southwest Florida. The first game at the Lee Health Sports Complex is Friday, Feb. 23, against the University of Minnesota. COURTESY / FORT MYERS ISLANDS, BEACHES AND NEIGHBORHOODS

The Post-Season losing streak is over.

That might be the headline from the 2023 season for the Minnesota Twins. They lost an improbable 18 consecutive post-season games from 2004 to 2020. It was the longest such streak in the history of the four major North American professional sports leagues.

Finally, in Game 1 of the 2023 American League Wild Card Series, they beat the Toronto Blue Jays 2-1. They then won Game 2 to advance to the American League Division Series,

They had a post-season winning streak. Of two games, they lost Game 1 of the American League Division series 6-4 to the Houston Astros and would go on to lose the series 3-1,

But they won their division and two playoff games. Those are significant developments.

Can the Twins build on that success?

They also received positive news over the winter about the greatest catcher in Twins history. The 6-foot-5 Joe Mauer was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

They have another large catcher in 6-foot-4 Ryan Jeffers, who belted 14 homers last year as a rookie in 76 games. That’s essentially half a season.

Who will Jeffers catch?

Reliever Jhoan Duran had two saves in the wildcard playoff round and 27 on the season.

Gone from the starting rotation is righthander Sonny Gray, now with the St. Louis Cardinals.

The starting rotation according to the team’s website before spring training opened, looked like this: Pedro Lopez, Joe Ryan, Bailey Ober, Chris Paddack and Anthony DeSclafani.

Lopez was acquired from the Miami Marlins in a trade that second baseman Luis Arraez south. Lopez was 11-8 with a 3.66 ERA for the Twins last year and was an All-Star.

The big name on the infield is shortstop Carlos Correa, who is entering his third season with the Twins. In his first two seasons he hit .261 with 40 homers. Correa is still only 29.

Gone from the infielder is veteran Jorge Polanco, who started a combined 781 games at either short or second for the Twins.

Rookie second baseman Eduoard Julien hit .263 last year with 16 doubles and 16 homers.

Third baseman Royce Lewis was the No. 1 overall pick in the 2017 draft. He started his injury-bedeviled career as a shortstop but is now at third. In 70 games over the past two years he’s hit .307 with 17 homers and 57 RBI. The homer and RBI totals may not leap off the page or screen but computed out to a 162-game season that would be 39 homers and 132 RBI.

A healthy Lewis for 150-plus games could make for an impact.

No mention of the Twins and injury bedeviled careers is complete without a mention of outfielder Byron Buxton. Like Lewis, he was a very high draft pick. In Buxton’s case he was the No. 2 overall pick in 2012.

Buxton is now 30 and in nine big-league seasons has played more than 92 games only once. That was in 2017. He hit .253 with 16 homers and 29 stolen bases and won a Gold Glove that year.

Right fielder Max Kepler played in 130 games last year, the most since playing 134 games in 2019. His production was also the highest it has been since then. Kepler hit .260 with 24 homers and 66 RBI.

Now what for the team?

The Twins started hot and ended hot last year. They won their first four games of the season and were 18-9 in September.

Even more important, they won a couple of playoff games in October. They obviously want to build on that. ¦

In the KNOW

• 2023 at a glance: 87-75, first place in the American League Central, won an American League Wildcard playoff round and were eliminated in the American League Championship Series.

• Off-season changes: Veteran infielder Jorge Polanco, a fixture in Minnesota, was traded to the Seattle Mariners in January for four players and cash considerations. Pitcher Sonny Gray, who was a combined 16-13 the past two years with the Twins, is now with the St. Louis Cardinals.

• Quirky historical oddity: The Twins last won the World Series in 1991. That was their first year training at the Lee Health Sports Complex. They previously trained at Tinker Field in Orlando. They haven’t been back to the World Series since 1991, 14 years before top prospect Walker Jenkins was born.

• 2024 outlook: See you in October. The Twins should return to the playoffs.

• Potential rookie impact player: Walker Jenkins will likely be a rookie impact player but not this year. Not this soon. The 6-foot-3, 210-pound centerfielder was the No. 5 overall draft pick last year and in 115 plate appearances in the low minors hit .362 with three homers and 22 RBI.

The post Play Ball! Minnesota Twins first appeared on Fort Myers Florida Weekly .