Disaster Zone

I'm not even going to pretend to be happy about any facet of tonight's game. To save everyone from having to read a relentless rant of immense frustration, I am going to keep this post short.

Despite having some success in his last couple starts (against bad offenses, mind you), Kyle Lohse looked terrible tonight. His pitches were not fooling ANYBODY, allowing a bad Kansas City offense to tag him for 4 run on 9 hits. That wasn't the worst of it though. I don't know what to think of Matt Guerrier. He came into the game with a solid ERA under 3, and in the first inning he pitched he looked great, striking out the first two batters he faced and dominating with his looping curveball. But then, as has been the case with Guerrier on numerous occasions this year, he fell apart in the second inning he pitched. Without recording an out, he walked the leadoff man, then gave up a single, then another single which scored a run. Enter JC Romero who, SURPRISE SURPRISE, allowed 2 inherited runners to score! Guerrier, Romero, and Jesse Crain pitched a combined 2 innings, and allowed only 3 hits, but walked FOUR and allowed 4 runs, putting the game out of reach for the Twins, who would rally in the ninth to get a couple runs but still falls short 8-5 to the Royals. It is their 3rd consecutive loss, essentially negating the nice little win streak they had put together.

The Twins got nice offensive performances out of a few players. Joe Mauer proved his great run-producing ability once again, going 3/5 with 3 RBI. Nick Punto, who had been slumping badly since his return from the DL, dropping his average 20 points, had a great night, going 4/5 including a first inning home run. Shannon Stewart also had a couple hits and a couple runs scored. HOWEVER, the 5-9 hitters (excluding Justin Morneau, who went 2/3), were a combined 0/14 (including the guys who pinch-hit for them)!! Absolutely abysmal. Matt LeCroy absolutely should NOT be starting against right-handed pitchers, he is just worthless against them.

Bad, bad game. 11 games out of first place. I'm just so disappointed.