Exching

Following an Opening Day loss to the Oakland Athletics where Minnesota Twins starter Kevin Correia gave up six runs in 5.2 innings, the Twins' revamped rotation only had one quality start in their last seven tries..

Sportswriter John Lowe coined the term quality start while writing for the Philadelphia Inquirer in 1985. He described it as a situation where a pitcher completes at least six innings and gives up only three runs. While it is not an all-encompassing statistic by any means, and it is not rooted in advanced metrics, when a rotation only produces one quality start in seven tries, it is enough to indicate that a team is having issues with its starting pitching.

Minnesota spent $49 million on Ricky Nolasco, $24 million on Phil Hughes and $11 million on Mike Pelfrey in the off-season. Through two starts, Nolasco is 0-1 with a 9.00 ERA. Hughes and Pelfrey have only made one start, but the former owns a 7.20 ERA and the latter is sitting at 5.06 with a loss.

So the $84 million question becomes: How much stock do you place on what has happened this season?

Correia, the lone man with a quality start, which came in a 7-6 loss to the Chicago White Sox on April 2, feels that people should not be quick to judge. "The starters were supposed to be a big improvement and hopefully get off to a good start," he says. "We haven't been bad, we haven't pitched great, but it's so early. At this point in the year there's no trends, there's no way you can look ahead and see what's going to happen. It's just early."

Kyle Gibson, a second-year player who is a year removed from Tommy John surgery, owns a 1.80 ERA and got the win in Cleveland on April 5, but did not get a quality start because he only pitched 5.0 innings against the Indians.

Pelfrey, who is also a year removed from Tommy John, coasted through five innings against the Indians the day before, retiring 15 of the 16 batters he faced, but got hammered in the sixth inning and was removed after only getting one out.

"[We're] thinking [he can go] seven, eight, nine innings here, maybe save our bullpen,' manager Ron Gardenhire told Phil Miller of the Minneapolis Star Tribune. "But once the next inning started, he wasn't the same pitcher."

"I was efficient. But the way it unraveled, who cares?" Pelfrey told Miller. "It kind of ruined the whole day."

"Gibby had a great start when he pitched and Pelfrey was really close and I think my last start was a good one and this one wasn't," said Correia. "We're not going out there and getting beat up, I don't think, but we're just a few pitches away here and there from getting deep into games. It's so early. It's hard to judge. We're not even through the rotation twice so it's impossible to predict what's going to happen."

Correia got hit around early in his start, giving up two runs in the second and three in the third, but then appeared to settle in. He retired eight straight batters before giving up a solo shot in the sixth that kept him from completing the inning.

"I started pitching in a little more," he said. "They got almost all their hits on off-speed pitches that were down and away so I made the adjustment and I just threw a hanging breaking ball on the first pitch."

Admittedly, the adjustment came too late, but the Twins scored a run in the second and two in the third, so they were only down 5-3 when Correia got the first two outs in the second inning. Derek Norris' homer in the sixth didn't help Minnesota's cause, but it was the two runs in the seventh, given up by reliever Samuel Deduno, that put the game out of reach.

"I would have liked to get that guy out. There were two outs, nobody on, and the first pitch he just jumped on it," says Correia of Norris. "You learn every time you face a guy like that you've never faced before and you see what his tendencies are. They had a different sort of game plan against me the last time I faced them."

While he says that it is too early to judge the pitching staff, Correia's underlying message is that things will get better. "You've got to get a couple starts under your belt and what I've noticed about a pitching staff is that they kind of get on a roll together," says Correia. "Once you start going, everyone feeds off each other and hopefully that's going to happen here real soon."

Tom Schreier can be heard on The Michael Knight Show from 2-3:00 on weekdays. He has written for Bleacher Report and the Yahoo Contributor Network. Follow him on Twitter @tschreier3.

The crazy thing about the whole Miguel Sano Tommy John surgery situation - other than that, well, an infield prospect is having Tommy John - is the fact that if there were an infielder on the roster that would be likely to have the procedure, it would be Trevor Plouffe..

It's easy to forget that Plouffe was once considered to be a pitching prospect before he signed with the Twins in 2004. He went 13-1 with a 0.71 ERA during his senior year at Crespi Carmelite high school in Encino, Calif. and had he gone to the University of Southern California, Plouffe would have pitched and played an everyday position in college. "(USC coach) Mike Gillespie and I talked about me playing shortstop and then coming in to close games," Plouffe told Seth Stohs, now a blogger at Twins Daily, in 2006.

There was a legitimate question as to whether or not Plouffe would pitch in the majors. In an article about whether or not Plouffe would decide to play at USC, a school he had grown up rooting for, or go pro, Eric Sondheimertold readers to take a step back and ponder what position Plouffe would play: "First, everyone must solve a pressing question: Is Plouffe a pitcher or a shortstop?" he wrote in 2004. "That provokes sharp debate and genuine disagreement among well-respected scouts."

Sondheimer was not writing for The Onion; he was writing for the Los Angeles Times. "The pro guys are really split because he is a prospect as a shortstop and pitcher," Gillespie told the Times. "I’m a shortstop who pitches," Plouffe said at the time. "Ultimately, it’s up to whomever lets you play."

Well, the Twins drafted him at No. 20 overall that year, offered him $1.5 million to sign and Plouffe went pro. "The decision to sign was very easy," he told Stohs. "You can’t pass up a chance to play pro ball with an organization like the Twins."

But Plouffe became neither a shortstop nor a pitcher. When he got called up as a 24-year-oldin 2010, he split time between short and second and as a designated hitter. By 2011 the team had tried him as a corner outfielder and at first base. The next year he beat out Danny Valencia at third base while hitting .235/.301/.455 with 24 home runs.

On Opening Day, Plouffe will have played every position except center field, catcher and... pitcher.

The point of writing this is not to suggest that Plouffe should have been developed as a pitcher. The point is that it wasn't Tommy John that forced Plouffe from the mound to the field a la Rick Ankiel. Rather, it's a blue-chip third base product that is having the procedure and Plouffe is the one that is going to benefit from another year at the hot corner.

There has been plenty of moaning and groaning among Twins fans hoping to see Sano who, along with Byron Buxton, is supposed to turn Minnesota around after three straight 90-loss seasons: Out with the old, in with the new. Except that Plouffe really isn't that old and should be capable of having a big season this year. He is in the middle of his prime and showed signs of progression last year before a calf injury and concussion slowed him down.

He was beginning to hit home runs to opposite field and with runners on base - something he did not do during his breakout 2012 campaign - and raised his batting average to .254.

If Plouffe can hit .260 to .280 with 25-plus homers, it's hard not to see him as an asset, even if his fielding is decidedly middle-of-the-pack compared to the rest of the league. He hit for power against righties (12 home runs) and average against lefties (.300), but hit only two home runs against lefties and .240 against righties while also continuing to show power to opposite field and produce with runners on base.

This really shouldn't be too far-fetched. Plouffe hit .244/.300/.430 in Triple-A in 2010, right before he got called up for his major league debut, then hit .313/.384/.635 in 2011, essentially forcing the Twins to bring him up again and find a spot for him on the field. The improvement was astronomical: Plouffe had never hit above .262, save for his first season in rookie ball, and suddenly was crushing the ball.

Babe Plouffe, as baseball nuts around the Twin Cities jokingly called him, had adjusted his batting stance and his swing and changed him from a ground-ball hitter to a fly-ball hitter. Still, the increase in production befuddled some of baseball's brightest minds. "Could anyone have predicted this?" asked SB Nation’s Rob Neyer. "Well, the Twins must have predicted something. Otherwise they wouldn't have drafted Plouffe in the first place, or stuck with him through all those seasons of minor-league mediocrity."

Aaron Gleeman of NBC Sports was even more critical about the Twins' development of Plouffe. "By promoting him so aggressively in the face of mediocre performances the Twins put Plouffe in an odd situation developmentally. He was a former first-round pick one step from the big leagues at age 22, yet he'd never actually shown anything to suggest that he was a top prospect," he wrote. "In short, he looked like a bust."

It's the Twins who chose to select him in the first round and give him $1.5 million to sign with them. It's the Twins who decided to promote him to Triple-A at age 22 despite the fact that he had never hit above .280 or 20 home runs at any level except in his rookie season. It's the Twins who turned him into a fly ball hitter and moved him all over the field.

Some of these moves have worked out and some haven't.

Look at Plouffe now: He's got the undistinguished honor of not being Miguel Sano. Some have written him off as a placeholder that they have no desire seeing once the Dominican blue-chipper arrives along and other big-name prospects hit their stride, but the Twins are making difficult decisions with all of their prospects right now. Players like Alex Meyer (No. 23, 2011), Kyle Gibson (No. 22, 2009)and Aaron Hicks (No. 14, 2008) are all supposed to develop into stars and supplement Buxton and Sano and bring a contending team back to the Twin Cities.

But if Trevor Plouffe does not pan out, what's to say that the others will?

Tom Schreier can be heard on The Michael Knight Show from 2-3:00 on weekdays. He has written for Bleacher Report and the Yahoo Contributor Network. Follow him on Twitter @tschreier3.

Manager Ron Gardenhire: We’re chasing, and it’s pretty easy to see: we can go one way or another. We need to pick up from where we left off, we had a nice road trip, but still we’re under .500 in the first half of the season. So we’ve got to work our way to .500 and go from there, and it starts right here at home.

We got a nice 10-game homestand inside our division for seven of them, and that’s where it all starts. We’ve gotta start playing better at home and hopefully win on this homestand, and then go from there.

General Manager Terry Ryan: It’s pivotal. We’re already six games below .500 -- that’s a long way to .500 at this juncture of the season. I would say this is an important time.

It isn’t going to make a season, but it certainly is going to affect the trade deadline.

We can’t afford to keep dropping back. We’re at a point now where there’s a lot of ground to be made up, and we’ve got to start making up some ground here. We can’t keep going back.

Gardenhire: The players are talking about trying to keep this thing together. That’s a normal conversation after the All-Star Break for every team. They don’t want to lose their teammates, and they all know it goes to how we play on the field, and that’s the bottom line. Whether we’ve done good enough to make that happen or not, it’s only upstairs.

Yes, it’s great to want to go out and keep everyone here, they’re all good buddies and everything, but we’ve got to go out and win baseball games, and whatever it takes to get this organization in the right shape, in the right place, that’s what’s going to happen.

All we can do is worry about going and playing. We’ve got to go play; we’ve got to go win baseball games. Normally it takes care of a lot of stuff if you just keep winning.

Ryan: I’m glad to hear that they’re saying that, that’s good, because they like what we’ve got in terms of talent, they think we’re heading in the right direction, it sounds like. But it’s not like it’s the front office [shakes hand high] and the players [shakes hand low] -- we’re in this together. We want to do what’s right. We all would like to be better, and we’d all like to have a better record, and we’d all like to be closer to the playoff teams, but we’re not right now, and we have to be if we expect to hold the group together.

Hopefully we do play well in the next 10 games and maybe string together (some wins). We did a nice job prior to the break. We had a nice little run, and we had a good road trip.

Gardenhire: [Gibson] hung in there. He had a couple big innings.

The first three runs, the tapper back to the mound, which is probably a double play if he doesn’t tip it, but instincts tell you to try and catch the ball. That ball was probably going to Doze [second baseman Brian Dozier] for a double play.

And then he gets a ball up to Longoria off the wall, and there’s your first three points.

And then Zobrist, he got behind him and threw a 2-1 slider and then tried to throw a fastball away, but he threw it right down the middle. And that’s a situation where he’s got a base open. He just misfired one and the guy hit it in the seats, and that’s his five runs, really.

He hung in there, but two big innings got him.

Starting pitcher Kyle Gibson: Really I got beat by three, four pitches tonight.

If I field my position there in the third inning, we get a double play. And it turns out if I let the ball go, Dozier’s right there up the middle on the shift, it’s a double play and defense gets me out of the inning. And then I leave a 2-0 fastball down the middle to Longoria. And then I ended up doing the same

thing to Zobrist later on: 3-1, good hitter, can’t leave a pitch right down the middle in that situation.

Ryan: Last night was disappointing. We only had six hits. We didn’t have good damage control; they put up the crooked number. It just was not a good game for us to start the second [half] right after the break.

We have got to do a better job -- we just did not put many good at-bats together last night. Certainly Kyle had the guy driving the ball off the wall, and it just doesn’t work. So it gets right back to execution and taking advantage of situations and damage control and all that kind of stuff, and that’s what I look for.

Last night wasn’t good. It never seemed like we were in that game. We need to do better than that.

Gardenhire: The names are here (for the upcoming game). Hughesy had a great first half for us and is throwing well, and we all know Mr. Price (starting pitcher David Price). If they pitch up to their capabilities, it could be a tough night for the hitters. Hopefully we’ll find a way to scratch something off of him and Hughesy will give us a good opportunity.

We all know that you don’t want to give up too many runs early against a guy like [Price] because he can get a lead and run. But going in there, we’ve seen him before, and if you’re competitive, you like this sort of thing. You like to face the good pitchers, just not too many of them in a row, and he’s a good one.

We’ll see who executes. That’s what it comes down to tonight: If he executes his pitches, he’s really tough.

Gardenhire: Three points early and we all know that guy pitching, we want to stay even with that guy; you don’t want to give him runs, and you saw what he can do. Price was unbelievable. He had great stuff tonight with all of his pitches, and he pretty much dominated us.

Hughesy gave up three, but actually hung in there pretty good and gave us an opportunity to get back into the game; we just weren’t able to do it. He didn’t have much, it looked like, early in the game, but he found a way to get through some innings for us, which is very important. And he gave us an opportunity to get back in there, but of course Price didn’t give us much of a chance.

Starting pitcher Phil Hughes: I battled as best I could.

I didn’t really have much to work with tonight and kinda had to make some pitches in some sequences in situations where I normally wouldn’t have done that because I knew right off the bat that I didn’t have much. Three-run second, you put yourself in a hole against one of the league’s best, so that was obviously the difference.

It’s tough. You come into a series after the break, and you want to get off on the right foot and a couple nights in a row where our starters didn’t do the job.

Third baseman Trevor Plouffe: It’s two games, man. It’s two games against two tough pitchers. There’s nothing that we’re going to do different, we’re going to work as hard as we’ve been working, and just try to get more guys on and get those hits with runners in scoring position, good timely hitting. That’s all you can do.

It’s a long season, and we’ll come back and win this next game and then go into the next series against Cleveland and try to win that.

Ryan: It’s not the way we would write it up. This hasn’t been good. We talked about Price and how important that game against [starting pitcher Alex] Cobb was, and we didn’t get that, and then we have to face Price, and this guy is no slouch today. He’s pretty good as well.

This hasn’t started out the way we had hoped or planned, but we’ve gotta regroup here and figure out a way to grind out a couple at-bats here. Our starting pitching gave up the long ball. That didn’t help any either. Once you get in a hole, like yesterday, you could feel that it just wasn’t a good feeling.

Yeah, this isn’t the way we had planned it.

We aren’t even .500; we’re a long way from .500 (44-52), frankly.

We have a fair idea of what we’re doing, where we’re at and who’s ahead of us. We’ve got a lot of clubs to jump through. Without coming out and saying it, until we get to .500, we’re not exactly where we want to be at this juncture in the season. We’re not at .500, in fact, we’re way below .500. That’s not a good spot to be in.

Gardenhire: I haven’t even looked at any of that (in reference to being at 999 career losses before the game). I don’t think it’s going to happen [in jest]. We’re gonna win the rest of our games.

I’m gonna say the same thing about 1000 wins as I will about 1000 losses, it means you’ve been managing a long time and you’re getting old.

I’ve been managing a long time.

Gardenhire: We all saw it: 90 pitches in four innings, and it was a hard 90, not an easy 90. He labored through it, kept the damage to a minimum. But he labored through it. He really didn’t have command of too much today, and he had to fight through everything, and there were men on base, and the game was really dragging with him.

I think he was probably worn out by the fourth inning.

Starting pitcher Kevin Correia: I feel like I just didn’t get in a good rhythm with their approaches.

If you throw 90 pitches in four innings it’s not that easy, but I was fine. I could have kept going.

Gardenhire: You know you’re running into good pitching with these guys, they got some arms, and you’re gonna have that. Today was disappointing because we had opportunities to get runs in, and we didn’t get them in. We’re desperately needing those guys to pick up some of those runs and get us back in that game, and then we can ad-lib a little bit.

But we left too many out there. The chances we did have were good chances to score runs, and we didn’t take advantage of them and that’s frustrating.

Correia: Obviously if you’re in a situation like this, you have to win and win a lot of games. You can’t go out there and lose two in a row, three in a row -- you’ve got to string long winning streaks together to get back in it. We’re not in an ideal position, we’re not in a position where we’re looking like, ‘Oh, we need a run and we’ll make the playoffs.’

Gardenhire: I can’t worry about [the trade deadline]. We just gotta keep trying to win ballgames. That’s upstairs, and there’s conversation going on. We’ll have meetings, we always do at this time of the year, talk with the staff and Terry and Rob and see where they’re at and see what they want to do.

But we’re not supposed to worry about it in the clubhouse. We’ve got to play baseball, we have to win baseball games, we have to figure out ways to score runs and win baseball games. That’s what we have to do in here.

Closer Glen Perkins: It’s frustrating. Our expectations are higher than that, and we need to play better. That’s all it comes down to. We had a chance to win in the last couple days, and we could have pitched better, obviously, and we had a chance at the end of the game that we didn’t find a way to win.

We didn’t make pitches early in the game and didn’t get the hits we needed late in the game.

Perkins: I know that I’m not going anywhere. We need to play better or there are going to be new faces here, and that’s what it boils down to is that either we play better or we’re going to have a new look, and that’s just how the game goes. I’ve got 24 other friends in here that I wouldn’t like to see go, but that’s the way it goes.

That’s the way the game works and they’re trying to make this team better, and if it means trading guys, than that is what it is.

Ryan: [The sweep] wasn’t good because we had a lot of momentum coming out of the All-Star Break and all those festivities; everything went great. All of a sudden we come here and we had a beautiful crowd on Friday night, and I think there was 35,000 maybe on Friday, and we just never got into the game. It’s like the air was let out of this place.

And then Price sent us down; we didn’t have a chance in that game. Yesterday we had a couple chances, maybe more than a couple. We had opportunities there at the end. Certainly we were in the game, we just didn’t get the hit that we were looking for, and now we’re trying to gain the trust and the faith of the fans again.

It was disappointing; there’s no doubt about that. You don’t have to just ask me, I think that clubhouse in there have faith in their heads, they just never got anything going. The starting pitching never set the tone: we were down 2-0 or 3-0 every game. I don’t think too many people brought this up, but Tampa Bay’s record was worse than ours when they came in here. We had a better record.

We didn’t play like it.

It was just a deflating series. Taking two of three there would have been beautiful. Winning one of three after the first two games would have been okay if we salvaged one. It’s just not a good feeling walking out of the ballpark those three days. ‘We’re gonna be okay’: Nope. Right now, we’re not okay.

Gardenhire: We all know they’re talking about it, and everybody’s talking about it. If you go on TV and you watch all these shows, they’re talking about it. They’re talking about all these different moves; all kinds of names get thrown out there.

It’s the same way every year, and you just have to put it on the backburner. It’s easy for me to sit here and say that, but out there in the clubhouse, they all know what’s at stake and there’s a lot of players where names are getting thrown around, and who knows who started them?

You just have to live with it; it’s part of the game. It’s a fun part for some people and not so much fun for others. Our guys are trying to cope with it as best they possibly can.

Ryan: That’s a dangerous question (whether anyone is untradeable) because you don’t want to put anything out there that’s not accurate. I can easily say, ‘Well, we’re in a bad spot, almost anyone on this club would be available.’

There’s some guys that have no-trade rights, we honor that. There are some players that under no circumstances, unless you were really overwhelmed -- you’ve always gotta listen. There’s no question about that. You can’t, before you even hear a team start talking, you’ve always got to pick up the phone and you always should be listening, and you’ve got to at least be receptive to what somebody is saying.

There are players on this team that would be very difficult to trade, even in the situation we were in the last four years. We have talent on this ballclub. There would be interest in many, not just one.

Gardenhire: I’ve always said: If your name is involved in these things, you should be happy because somebody likes you, somebody might be thinking about getting you and bringing you over.

Honestly, it should be a compliment to guys. I know, like a [Josh] Willingham, I know he likes it here, his family’s here, the whole package, and I think their thoughts are more towards having to move their families and all those things moreso than anything else. And he’s been traded before, so it’s not a first for him, but they should look at it as a sign of respect. People are showing respect to you as a player, if they put your name out there, as being one of the guys somebody’s interested in.

Willy’s definitely one of those guys, I’m sure. A right-handed power guy, so it should be a sign of respect for them. I think they should take it as a compliment and try not to worry about it, but it happens. It’s part of it.

My name was not mentioned when I played. Well it was, but it was back to Double-A.

Gardenhire: The ballgame was another one of those games I thought [starter] Kris [Johnson] did fine; a lot of pitches again in five innings. He didn’t attack like we were hoping he would. First inning was good, and after that he kind of picked around the zone a little too much for us. But he competed, he gave us a chance, that’s all we ask -- give us a chance -- we scored some runs early.

[Set-up man] Casey [Fien], I think he just missed the zone. He was going away and got one over the inner part of the plate and guy’s swing was up the middle, but fortunately for us Hammer (outfielder Josh Willingham) put a really nice swing on a ball, and Perk came in and did a nice job, and a nice win for us, a really nice win.

Ryan: I told [Kris Johnson], I wished I could change places with him because he’s got all kinds of ability.

We’ve got to get him to the point up where it’s just he doesn’t have any worries other than to get people out. Forget the pitch count and all that stuff; just get people out as far as you can go, and we’ll handle the rest.

We could have given it another go, but I figured, ‘Alright, that was enough to give him another go.’ He needs to get better than that. He’s better than that.

Gardenhire: Pino battled, hung in there pretty doggone good, we just didn’t do much offensively. We had some chances again and misfired a couple times when we had some opportunities. And then the game got a little out of whack there at the end. Matty didn’t have a good night.

Second baseman Brian Dozier: Everything is good. We know what’s around the corner and stuff. We try not to think about all that stuff, but at the same time, we feel like we’re still a good ball club and that we can win some games. We’ve just go to start pitching better, playing defense better and especially hitting better with men on base, that’s all.

Gardenhire: When we got out there Matty said, ‘I’m fine.’ Which is kind of embarrassing.

I was embarrassed for going out there when he told me he’s fine, and I basically screamed at him. Told him he might as well get somebody else out.

So yeah, that wasn’t fun.

Gardenhire: A great win for our ballclub, winning a series, and a really tough moment here because Matty Guerrier (designated for assignment) means a lot to a lot of us in here in this organization and in this clubhouse. He’s a first class guy and a really tough moment here. It kind of takes away from a big win.

Ryan: We’ve got a lot of history with [Guerrier], me especially. We claimed him off waivers from the White Sox way back when. (Guerrier was actually acquired from Pittsburgh in 2003, but Chicago originally drafted him). We brought him in on a claim, and all of a sudden we’re designating him. It’s not the way you like to see things go, but he’s a class guy and he’s been a great member of this organization for about a decade.

Gardenhire: It was brutal. That’s not fun at all. We had him when I first broke in as a manager. He was a big, huge part of our bullpen, a guy that just always got it done. You could give him the ball and never worry about him. He’d take the ball every day, it didn’t matter how many innings, he never complained. He’s one of the more likeable guys you’ll have in a uniform and a lot of fun to be around, so that was really hard for all of us -- Terry, myself, Andy (pitching coach Rick Anderson) and Scotty Ullger have been around him a really long time.

Ryan: Well, we’re at that time of year. We aren’t doing well on the field, and we’re getting to the trade deadline here, and there was interest in Kendrys. We thought it was wise before we got to that free agent period later in the year, it made sense to see what we could get in return, so that’s the reason. Nothing more; nothing less. It’s that time of year.

Gardenhire: It’s always good for a player when a player is interested in you. Kendrys has been there before. I think he liked it here. His family was here and he enjoyed his time here, but we kind of put ourselves in a position where we’re at that spot where this is gonna happen and put him in the middle of a pennant race out there, which is fun for him.

And we’ve got a nice little pitcher back here. A big kid who can throw the baseball. We’ve seen him, and it’s gonna happen. I got the call this morning, and there you have it. Now we’ll see where we go from here.

Starting pitcher Phil Hughes: It’s tough. We come off that road trip where we played pretty well, and everyone thinks we have this great big homestand, and we have a chance to turn things around a little bit, and it obviously hasn’t been the case so far. But we just have to keep plugging away.

The nature of a guy like Morales who was a big addition when we got him, and then that’s kinda the situation you’re in. You have an opportunity to move a guy and get some prospects, and so that’s the way it goes. We know it’s our responsibility to play better, and then we won’t be in that situation.

We just need to keep plugging away, there’s no alternative.

Gardenhire: We’re pretty thin out there. We need Kevin to pitch a little bit for us here. Definitely Swarzak and Deduno are out. Pressly threw a couple last night, he’ll probably say he can go, but the rest of them are one inning guys more than anything else.

Starting pitcher Kevin Correia: I made my two worse pitches of the night to two of probably their best hitters: two hanging curveballs. Hanging back, it’s pretty much the only two pitches I’d like to have back.

Just overall it just didn’t go that well. We hit the ball decently at the end of the game, and at that point we were down too many runs.

Saturday’s starting pitcher Logan Darnell: It’s probably the same emotion, close to it. It’s different this time because I actually know the game I’m throwing so it’s not that feeling of just waiting and waiting and waiting. This is a little better that I know when I’m going to start the game, but as far as going out there it’s the same mind frame as last time: just try to get each guy out and see how long I can do it for.

Ryan: It’s that time of year. It’s about the toughest 10-day period for any GM is this time. This and the Winter Meetings, the Winter Meetings are like this -- people coming and going, a lot of rumors certainly.

It’s probably a seller’s market just because there’s so many teams still in contention for that second wild card. There’s a lot of teams four or five games out. Tampa Bay, a week ago we were talking about them…selling. They were about four-and-a-half out, so that should be past. They’ve got as good of a chance as anybody with that pitching staff.

Let’s say you put together a stellar August and September, all of a sudden you’ve got a chance to win the division.

We were nine back about this time six, seven, eight years ago, we won that thing going away. We had a good club. We had a good club and things didn’t go well, then all of a sudden we got even and we took off.

Nine games out. What are we? Twelve, 11 now?

Where we’re at right now feels a heck of a lot different than where we were then.

Gardenhire: He made some decent pitches.

He made enough pitches, but unfortunately it’s five innings again with a starter. We’re fortunate that Pressly came in and did a heck of a job, limited the number of pitches and then we got Perkins in, but we were pretty thin out there. We needed innings.

Gardenhire: It’s frustrating for myself and my coaching staff because we go out there and do the routine every day, and yesterday was one of those days where the starting pitcher just ate us up. For this homestand, we had pretty big hopes on this homestand to do some good, and we really have not played well at all.

We wanted this 10-game homestand. We sure didn’t handle it very well. We talked about: This is a good chance to do things, and we just haven’t played well at home, which is just really disappointing.

Ryan: We have to get back to competitive baseball. We haven’t been competitive here the last week or so. The White Sox have dominated us, and they aren’t all that far different from us with their record, but it doesn’t look like that right now. The guy, Sale, yesterday, all right: He dominated us, but so did Noesi, so we’ve got to get back to competitive baseball, giving ourselves a chance. We haven’t had much of a chance to win a game here for a while, since Cleveland for sure, so that’s where we need to go.

Yeah, it’s disappointing because we came out of the break, and, Tampa Bay, they weren’t much different than our record either. Well, that has changed. There are people going one way, and there are people going the other. We’re going the wrong way.

Gardenhire: We needed a win. We said that. It’s fun shaking hands, it was very entertaining at the end with Perk out there. I think if you’re a player out there, you got two choices: Do I want the ball hit to me, or do I not want it hit to me? And I think a lot of our guys were iffy on that, but it was tense, it was really tense.

Outfielder Sam Fuld: When that ball came out of the sun, it was a big sigh, yeah. It’s never easy.

Gardenhire: It’s been really frustrating around here and we know we haven’t hit much, and we haven’t pitched very much in this homestand. It was a pretty disappointing homestand, but as I said before, to get the win today was huge. A lot of smiles out there, a lot of relief and you’ll talk to more than one guy out there, but they’ll all tell you the same thing -- that was probably as intense of a ninth inning that you can get.

Perkins: We’ve been inconsistent. I’ve said many times that we’re not a bad team; we’re just inconsistent. And that’s because we score runs one day, and we don’t the next day; we pitch good one day, and then we don’t pitch good the next day. That’s been the most frustrating part is that we’re just inconsistent.

Hopefully we’ll show up. Hopefully we’ll go to Kansas City and play the baseball that we’re capable of. And do it on offense and defense and with our pitching and everything.

Tom Schreier can be heard on The Michael Knight Show from 2-3:00 on weekdays. He has written for Bleacher Report and the Yahoo Contributor Network. Follow him on Twitter @tschreier3.

-- General manager Terry Ryan at the Morales signing press conference (6/8/14)

The Minnesota Twins signed Kendrys Morales a day after beating the Houston Astros 8-0 and improving their record to 29-31. Ryan felt this was a move that would improve the team’s anemic offense while also infusing a rush of confidence to the clubhouse.

Later that day, Minnesota would get routed by Houston, 14-5, and there were mixed feelings in the clubhouse. Everyone was down because the team had just lost a series to a rebuilding Astros club, but there was still a feeling of excitement in the clubhouse because of the new addition. “That does a lot just for the guys in here for how they reward our play so far," said closer Glen Perkins. “We have a similar record to what we had last year, but we think we’re a lot better team, and making moves like that, taking chances on guys and making us better goes a long way here for guys’ confidence and that we’re all on the same page here."

The Twins never reached .500 after signing Morales. In fact, they suffered two separate five-game losing streaks and stood at 44-50 entering the All-Star Break. Morales, a designated hitter and first baseman, entered the break hitting .229/.254/.582, worse numbers than his rookie year and far lower than his .277/.329/.471 career line. “Since I last talked you about that subject," said Ryan, nearly a month later, in regards to whether the Twins would be buyers or sellers at the trade deadline, “we have gone the wrong way. We’ve lost too many games, and now we’re in a tough spot. Do you know whose shoulders that falls on?

“Mine."

That was on July 6, a day before Minnesota went on a seven-game road trip to Seattle and Colorado. Before the road trip, the Twins appeared to be in fire sale mode, but after going 5-2 against the Mariners and Rockies, the dynamic shifted. “We knew coming into this whole road trip, it was not necessarily make-or-break, but it was a huge test of what we’re going to do after the break, whether buy or sell, all that stuff," second baseman Brian Dozier told Mike Berardino of the Pioneer Press. “I want to try to do everything to contend. In all our opinions, we think we’re good enough."

The Twins need to go for broke right now. There is no shame in aiming for the playoffs and ending up with a 75-win record. Shoot for the moon, land among the stars, as the say. It would be an improvement, but more importantly it tells you a lot about how much team management considers the fans in their decision. The bottom line is: This is a no brainer. The Twins need try and contend for a playoff spot because a) they don’t have much to sell, and b) a fire sale creates a culture of losing, which is already forming at Target Field.

The time to win is now.

The Twins basically have four trading chips: Morales, pitcher Kevin Correia, left fielder Josh Willingham and catcher Kurt Suzuki. Only one of those guys would get a decent return: Suzuki. Morales, who was signed to a prorated $8 million contract, will be sold for cents to the dollar right now. Correia was an All-Star in 2011, but has never pitched 200 innings in a season and owns a career 4.50 ERA. Willingham hit .260/.366/.524 with 35 home runs and 110 RBI in 2012, the first year of his 3-year, $21 million contract -- at the time, the biggest free agent contract in Twins history -- but the 35 year old has become inconsistent and isn’t hitting much better than his .208/.342/.368 line last season.

Suzuki earned his first All-Star appearance this season after a strong first half (.309/.365/.396) but had suffered from wear and tear in his previous three seasons, batting only .230 while battling wrist issues and other ailments as a member of the Oakland Athletics and Washington Nationals. Not only will teams expect his production to regress over time, but he’s valuable to the Twins right now. Without Suzuki, the team is relying on career minor leaguer Eric Fryer and outfielder/catcher Chris Herrmann behind the plate. Josmil Pinto may take over at some point, but right now his defense needs a lot of work. A 2- or 3-year extension should be in order for Suzuki, 30, this offseason.

If the Twins are going to trade Morales, Correia or Willingham, it would be to create space on the field for their young players. Kennys Vargas is a 23 year old that is hitting .291/.364/.480 with 15 home runs at Double-A New Britain before the break. Like Morales, he is a designated hitter that can make spot starts at first base and has shown enough to get a shot in the majors sooner than later. Correia could be moved for top pitching prospects Alex Meyer or Trevor May, who are the future of the Twins rotation. By moving Willingham, Minnesota allows Chris Parmelee, Aaron Hicks, Oswaldo Arcia and perhaps Chris Colabello to audition for a spot on the major league roster next season.

In this case, the Twins aren’t selling in hopes of a big return -- none of those four players, even Suzuki, would merit a Top 100 prospect -- but rather to create room for their younger players to get major league experience or compete for a spot on next year’s roster. By moving Morales, Correia and Willingham, the focus would be on selling off spare parts, not trying to add new ones.

Everyone was shocked when the Twins lost 99 games in 2011. ESPN and Sports Illustrated had Minnesota winning the AL Central again, and nobody could have predicted that the M&M Boys -- Joe Mauer and Justin Morneau -- would suffer from significant injuries that hampered their production that season or that the rotation -- Carl Pavano, Nick Blackburn, Kevin Slowey, Scott Baker -- would have imploded.

In 2012 and 2013, poor management decisions from years past haunted the team. The lopsided J.J. Hardy trade and failed Tsuyoshi Nishioka experiment left the Twins without a major league caliber shortstop. Delmon Young’s attitude made fans wonder why the team traded away Matt Garza and Jason Bartlett for him when there was a need for quality pitching and a plug at short. And Aaron Hicks was not ready to make the leap from Double-A when Denard Span and Ben Revere were traded away.

As a result, the Twins, once a model small-market team that had won six division titles from 2002-2010, whose No. 1 concern was how they would beat the New York Yankees in a playoff series, suddenly had other issues to deal with. After christening Target Field with a 94-win season in 2010, the team had become cellar dwellers in Target Field. One losing season is an anomaly. Two is the start of a pattern. Three becomes a trend.

Fans went from wondering why Ron Gardenhire wasn’t annually given the Manager of the Year award -- he was a runner-up for five years before winning it in 2010 -- to wondering why he had a job. He joined Tom Kelly, the man who brought two World Series to the Twin Cities, in the 1000-win club in April of this year, but he will also hit 1000 losses this season. He would have been left hanging at 998 wins last year if he had not been offered a two-year extension shortly after the 2013 season concluded.

Gardenhire, who only had one losing season from 2002-2010, suddenly is faced with the realistic possibility of enduring four straight.

This is the year to establish a winning culture again. Even though it hasn’t worked out perfectly, ownership made an effort by signing Morales, and Ryan did so by speaking his infamous words: “Why not the Twins?" There is no reason to burn it down and wait for next year. Yes, Miguel Sano and Byron Buxton are supposedly on the way. So are Meyer and May. But none of those players will succeed when introduced to a losing culture.

Trading away players at the deadline can be an effort to lay down the foundation for a winning team years down the road, but retaining players to make a playoff push -- even if it proves fruitless in the end -- can have the same effect in the right circumstances. Right now, the Twins have to approach the second half of the season like they did all those years when they came out of nowhere to force Game 163: playoffs or bust.

Tom Schreier can be heard on The Michael Knight Show from 2-3:00 on weekdays. He has written for Bleacher Report and the Yahoo Contributor Network. Follow him on Twitter @tschreier3.

Kurt Suzuki replaced Joe Mauer’s production this season. Just let that sink in.

For how much Minnesotans complain about their erstwhile hometown hero, Mauer’s production has been off the charts since he joined the Twins in 2004. His 2009 numbers (.365/.444/.587, 28 HR, 96 RBI) will be difficult to replicate, even for him, but what made them even more impressive was he did that while catching.

His days of chasing .400 seem far away, but before his career-altering concussion the former Cretin-Derham Hall star was hitting .324/.404/.476, good enough for his fourth Silver Slugger Award. His head injury ultimately removed him from behind the plate, and the Twins, having traded Wilson Ramos in an ill-fated transaction years earlier, needed somebody to fill in at catcher while Josmil Pinto developed.

Suzuki was that man.

The longtime Oakland A’s backstop was hardly unknown. He was a decent hitter and solid defensive player in the South Bay from 2007-11, but his numbers dropped as he split time with Oakland and the Washington Nationals in 2012 and 2013. After topping out as a .275 hitter in 2008 and 2009, his second and third years in the league, Suzuki hit .230 in the last three years before joining Minnesota.

The common thought was that he was worn down from frequent, aggressive play. In Oakland he was known to play upwards of 130 games a year. In 2008 and 2009 he played 148 and 147 games, respectively, but was held to 94 games last season. The 1-year, $2.75 million contract he received from the Twins hardly suggests they thought he was going to be the offensive force he became this season, but a combination of need, fit and the fact that it was a contract year created a perfect formula for Suzuki in Minnesota.

While the Hawaiian probably was not thrilled about playing in the cold early in the year, he instantly felt comfortable in the Twins’ clubhouse and was well received among the pitching staff and position players. “Those catchers, man, those catchers have those personalities where they kind of click with the pitching staff and the hitters," says reliever Casey Fien. “I mean, we’re kind of segregated, but with the catchers, they’re the neutral party so they need to be with everybody. Kurt has that personality of being able to click with everybody and having something in common."

The question is: How does he do it? How is he having his best year at age 30? How did he fit in with a team of people that he, for the most part, didn’t know?

And, ultimately: Will he stay?

Six-time All-Star; three-time batting champion; three-time Gold Glove Award winner; and

American League MVP.

Mauer received all those awards while catching for the Twins. He was the anomaly: the backstop that could hit. He was the first overall pick in the 2001 draft. Paul Molitor and Cal Ripken Jr. said that he had the best swing they had ever seen. And on top of that, he averaged more than 20 points per game as a guard at Cretin and was offered a football scholarship at Florida State University to play under Bobby Bowden.

He had a fall from grace in 2011, of course, when he suffered from bi-lateral leg weakness, but came back and hit well above .300 in 2012 and 2013. Had it not been for his concussion, Mauer still would be calling games and Suzuki probably would have signed with another team.

Suzuki doesn’t deny it: He knew that he would be compared with Mauer the day he signed with Minnesota. “I believe it, and rightfully so," he says. “I’ve got so much respect for Joe. I played against him when I was with Oakland and last year with Washington a little bit. That guy goes out, he wins batting titles, he’s an MVP while taking a beating back there, and that’s impressive.

“He’s definitely one of the guys that I respect probably most in this league. And to be able to be on his team now, I’ll take comparisons all day long if I get to suit up with Joe."

“I’m not going to get caught up comparing the two players," says Jared Burton, who played with Suzuki in Oakland’s farm system, “but he’s done better than anybody could have expected. I knew he would be utilized here, especially with the move we made with Joe. It’s been perfect. He slid right in and became a great catcher for us."

Burton lobbied hard among the players to get Suzuki to join the team. He had played with him in Oakland’s minor league system in 2005 and 2006 and developed a strong relationship with him before being selected by the Reds organization in the minor league portion of the Rule 5 draft in 2007. “Whenever we played the A’s last year, Burton always talked about how Kurt was an awesome guy, somebody he would love to throw to," says Fien. “We heard a lot of good things about him through Burt, and Burt doesn’t throw around comments like that very often."

“I can’t imagine there being a better fit for him, personality-wise, than this team," says Burton. “When we signed him this offseason, I was really happy for this organization and happy for him because I knew he would fit right in."

The Twins knew what they were getting when they signed Suzuki. Gardenhire says that he talked to other teams and knew he was an asset in the locker room as well as out of it. Twins general manager Terry Ryan echoed that same sentiment about the catcher, saying he had a track record and was a targeted player, even if the team had been aiming at A.J. Pierzynski and Jarrod Saltalamacchia in the offseason as well. “He’s had a pretty good career already," says Ryan of Suzuki, “even before coming here. I’m glad we have him; he’s done a nice job here. He’s good in the clubhouse, he’s good in the community, he’s produced -- I don’t know what else I can tell you."

Suzuki says that having Burton in the locker room helped right away, even if he is outgoing and personable by nature. “Definitely knowing some guys makes it comfortable," he says. “Having played with Burty for a few years with Oakland definitely helped."

Instead of addressing him as Jared, Suzuki calls him Lights Out Levi, which is derived from Burton’s given name. “Everybody has heard me call him Levi, and I don’t know if anybody would call him that," says Suzuki, laughing. “They might have, but I’ve always called him Levi since we played together in A-ball."

“I knew his name was Levi," says Fien, a smirk developing across his face when asked about the moniker. “Actually, I heard [the nickname] this last road trip. Me and my wife were talking to him and my wife loves his name, Levi, so then he started talking nicknames, and so I kinda knew."

Stockton resident Bill Richardson, a local super fan of Oakland’s High-A farm team, gave Burton the name. “He would travel on the road sometimes, and then all of a sudden you’d just hear him yelling and you’d be like, ‘Oh, he’s there.’" says Burton, shaking his head. “I took over the closer role like halfway through the season that year and pitched really well and he would yell, ‘Lights Out Levi!’ and Kurt kind of took it, and that’s what he’d call me that year."

Ryan says that despite their relationship and the fact that Burton was lobbying among the players to sign Suzuki, he did not reach out to his reliever in his evaluation of the catcher. “I don’t talk to players too often about that because it could be one guy’s favorite," he says, “and it could be the other guy’s enemy."

In this case, that doesn’t look like it would be a problem. Everyone seems to like Suzuki.

Suzuki grew up in Hawaii, loves to surf and listens to reggae. Put him on the diamond, however, and he gets all fired up. “He’s a red-ass," says Gardenhire. “You can print that."

The same guy that leads pitcher’s meetings with the composure of a CEO and offers young hurlers the calming presence of a shrink also has the incendiary qualities of his manager. “He’s got a little fire in him, and that’s okay, I like that part of it too," continues Gardenhire. “He gets frustrated when we give up runs, and he’s got a little bit of that."

Gibson remembers a moment when he walked a guy on a 3-2 breaking ball earlier this year. He was about to get out of the inning, but suddenly found himself in a jam. As Suzuki walked out to the mound, Gibson knew what was coming. “I can’t say every word he said," offers Gibson, laughing, “but he comes out and said, ‘That was a stupid pitch, I let you get away with it, and don’t do it again! Let’s get this guy out.’"

Safe to say, Gibson got the next guy out.

“He’s not afraid to do that," continues Gibson. “He takes pride in what he’s doing. If I walk a guy or give up a run, he kind of takes it personally."

“He yells at himself in the dugout," says Gardenhire, chuckling. “He takes a lot of pride in not giving up runs."

“I hate losing, and I hate failing," admits Suzuki, “I’m pretty intense, but between the lines I try to be laid back. There’s certain times to be the ass and certain times to be calm, but I’m just competitive by nature, and I definitely hate losing."

Burton believes that Suzuki developed that attitude as a walk-on at Cal State Fullerton, one of the best college baseball programs in the country. “He’s just got that mentality that he’s never going to be satisfied," says Burton. “You take a guy that walked on at a program like Cal State Fullerton and turned himself into a second rounder, that’s pretty impressive. That lets you know what he’s all about."

“I’ve always had to be that guy that had to prove himself. Nothing was really given to me," says Suzuki. “Having to walk on at Fullerton, my mindset is always go out there and not just prove people wrong, but prove to myself that I can do it and be successful."

“I had to go out there and earn it, and I believe that’s how everything should be," he adds. “You should have to earn everything you’ve got."

Suzuki didn’t just develop an attitude at Fullerton; he also procured a strong work ethic. He played under three coaches there that ended up being head coaches at other programs shortly after he left. George Horton, who was the head coach at Fullerton from 1996-2007, is currently the head coach at the University of Oregon. Dave Serrano, who took over for him, is currently the head coach at Tennessee. And Rick Vanderhook, who is the current Fullerton coach, was an assistant while Suzuki was there.

“That’s just what kind of program you’ve got when you’ve got three leaders like that that you get ready to play for," he says. “I feel very fortunate for that, and it definitely helped lead me to where I am today."

“He still does the same things (he did at Fullerton), still prepares as much as anybody," says Burton. “He’s watching video at the beginning of each series; he’s leading the pitcher’s meetings because he knows exactly what these guys do."˙

“He’s got that assertive personality," says Gibson. “He’s not afraid to say something, step up and tell you when you’re wrong and admit when he’s wrong. But he knows what he’s talking about a lot of the time."

“He’s our leader," says Fien, emphatically. “He’s the guy everybody goes to if we have a problem. He’s also in with the coaches; the coaches love him here."

“He’s one of the chemistry guys," echoes Gardenhire, “but also a very good baseball player."

Here’s the crazy thing: Had the Twins got Pierzynski, ostensibly their first choice, they would have gotten a clubhouse cancer -- Pierzynski signed with the Boston Red Sox and was recently designated for assignment. With Suzuki, they got an instant leader.

What makes Suzuki special is that he offers both the comfort of a laid-back Hawaiian dude, and the jolt of reality from somebody that has that assertive personality and will get in your face. He’s relatable to the player that needs to calm down after a bad outing as well as the guy that needs to be told he’s underperforming. He’s also a missing link: guys like Mauer and Phil Hughes tend to lead by example, Trevor Plouffe has a fun, playful energy, Brian Dozier is cheerful and conversational and Josh Willingham just says it as it is. But nobody was the igniter until Suzuki showed up.

“There’s guys that lead by example. He leads by example well, but he’s also got that fireball personality that allows him to speak up well," says Gibson. “It just depends on the team you have. I mean, Joe’s always been the lead-by-example guy: You rarely see him get fired up or allow his emotions to take the best of him. You need guys like both of them, so it works out really good."

It’s not all personality, of course. For many players it is his preparation. Suzuki knows all the hitters, the strengths and weaknesses of his pitching staff and the repertoire of the starting pitcher he will face that day. It all goes back to his college days: He was the un-recruited high schooler that had to walk on to his college team and go the extra mile to stay on it. He has a drive to be one step ahead of everybody mentally in order to let his natural talents and assertive attitude manifest itself.

“That’s what you need with a guy behind the plate," says Burton. “You’re unsure about what to throw to a guy, then you’re going to be confident throwing whatever he puts down."

Fien says that building a repertoire with Suzuki wasn’t difficult, and after a few outings, the two had established a sublime connection -- something that is common among all the pitchers and Suzuki. “A couple games is all you need to see what is working for me to get people out and what he sees," says Fien, “and once we’re on the same page, I’ll tell him what I want to do."

He pauses. “But sometimes he has a different idea."

During one of his first outings with Suzuki, Fien said that he wanted to go fastball in. Fien does not throw particularly hard, but locates the ball well and tends to use his fastball in and out to throw hitters off balance, while mixing in a steady diet of cutters to change speeds and create movement on the ball. At 30, he has a pretty good idea of what he wants to do on the mound, but that day Suzuki walked up to the mound and had a different plan in mind.

“I said I want to go fastball in and he goes, ‘No, we’re not going to go fastball in,’" says Fien, “and I go ‘Alright, let’s go fastball away.’" Unhappy with the selection, Suzuki told him, “No, let’s not go fastball away, let’s throw a cutter back door."

“And I was like, ‘Alright, let’s go cutter back door,’" Fien says, laughing as he recalled the story. “He knows the hitters, he knows what he wants, and I don’t know why he didn’t just come out and say it."

Among the staff, almost everybody says they have shaken Suzuki off at least once, but because the meetings are so thorough and he knows the pitchers so well, there’s often no reason to disagree with him. “He definitely gives you the freedom to shake," says Gibson. “The more I throw to him, I wouldn’t say I ever lacked confidence in him because from the get-go, you know his history, you know how long he’s been in the league and the job he’s done with other staffs, so he just makes you feel comfortable and allows you to throw any pitch with conviction."

“He’s not really one of those guys (that you can’t shake)," says Burton. “He knows as a bullpen guy, more often than not we’ll come in and face a guy one time [and] we’ll go with our strength. He may put something down that may suggest something he’s seen in the video room, but we want to go with something else, and we can both live with that."

“Listen, I’m a suggestion box, and if a guy shakes me off and he feels 100 percent convicted in throwing that pitch, throw it," says Suzuki, his fiery attitude slowly emerging as he speaks. “Obviously if he doesn’t throw it at the right spot, we’re going to have a little talk about it."

A little talk, mind you, that typically involves high decibels and a few choice words.

“I’m a suggestion box," he says, “with a strong suggestion."

On July 1, while chasing a pop up in foul territory in a game against the Kansas City Royals, Suzuki ran into a pole near the dugout at full speed. His foot slid into a hole behind the pole and he took the brunt of the impact in the chest. This was only a few days after he was stunned for a few minutes by a foul-tip to the same region and another one that hit his facemask.

“He’s nuts," said Gardenhire after the game. He paused for a few seconds, put his face down and laughed to himself in front of all the cameras. “I don’t know what he’s -- he’s a psycho man running through that wall," he continued. “Everyone was saying, ‘No. No. No.’ And he just kept running, and then he said, ‘That really hurt.’"

Everyone laughed at that comment. “It sure looked like it did," concluded the manager. “Tough guy, you know."

Suzuki’s toughness appeared to have caught up with him in recent years, however. He’s a guy that likes to play every day, and wrist issues, as well as general wear and tear, had caused his production to drop in his last few seasons with Oakland and Washington.

When asked about why Suzuki’s production has increased this season, Twins general manager Terry Ryan immediately pointed to his health.

“Well, he’s 100 percent," Ryan said. “I know he had some wrist issues last year. But he’s been good since the first day, he’s really solidified some of that behind the plate, allowed us to pick and choose when we wanted to play Pinto and now bringing [Eric] Fryer -- he’s got the durability and stamina, he can play a lot so you don’t have to worry too much about that position."

The key for Suzuki, then, is to balance being a wild man and being an everyday player.

There are a lot of questions surrounding Suzuki in the second half of the season: Will he stay, or will the Twins trade him? Can he keep up his production after taking a beating night-in and night-out? Minnesota will also have to weigh the risks of re-signing a 30-year-old catcher based off of one good season who may want a long-term contract.

Those concerns can wait until later, however. For right now, let’s just focus on this: The Twins made a savvy pickup in the offseason, and Suzuki is a perfect fit in Minnesota.

Tom Schreier can be heard on The Michael Knight Show from 2-3:00 on weekdays. He has written for Bleacher Report and the Yahoo Contributor Network. Follow him on Twitter @tschreier3.