Ok, today’s injury updates are stolen straight from Joe C. over at the Strib:
J.J. Hardy has a swollen left knee and is being checked by a doctor. He’s not sure how he injured himself.
Denard Span fouled a ball off his right foot Saturday, came in sore today and is not in the lineup.
Jim Thome has a knot in the left side of his back and is a little concerned, though Manager Ron Gardenhire said the training staff is confident they’ll remedy it soon.
Jason Repko has a bruised right thumb.
Gardenhire isn’t sure if Joe Mauer will play in Kansas City and said he’ll likely DH when he first comes back.
Gardy will be managing today, though his right ear isn’t pretty.
That pretty much covers the actual injuries. However, I gotta think that it’s not just fans that are groggy after last night’s marathon game. And today’s lineup really does look like a fairly standard Gardy Day Game lineup card. Of course, today that might actually be out of necessity! I would still like to see the Twins salvage a win out of this series right now just to keep the roll going.
| Minnesota | @ | Detroit |
| Revere, CF | Jackson, A, CF | |
| Hudson, O, DH | Wells, C, RF | |
| Young, D, LF | Raburn, LF | |
| Cuddyer, 1B | Cabrera, M, 1B | |
| Kubel, RF | Peralta, J, DH | |
| Valencia, 3B | Inge, 3B | |
| Morales, J, C | Sizemore, 2B | |
| Tolbert, 2B | Santiago, SS | |
| Punto, SS | Laird, C | |
| Duensing, P | Porcello, P |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E | |
| Minnesota | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 4 | 1 |
| Detroit | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | x | 5 | 8 | 0 |
I say we just pretend this series didn’t happen. I can’t think of a single positive thing to say about today’s game, other than Brian Duensing at least got through enough innings that the bullpen should have gotten time to recover from the Saturday night debacle. That’s three straight subpar starts for the starting pitchers scheduled for games 1-3 of the the playoffs. No reason to panic, but that doesn’t mean we have to like seeing it.
On to Kansas City… let’s get healthy and back in the habit of winning down there against the Landed Gentry. – JC