The A’s magic number is 1, so a win over Minnesota today will allow the Twins to watch an opponent celebrate a season’s worth of hard work and success as that team clinches a berth in the postseason.
The Twins might want to get used to that. It’s quite likely the Tigers will celebrate the same thing at some point during their upcoming series with the Twins and even the Indians could conceivably clinch a wild card spot during their series with the Twins next weekend.
I hope someone on this team is at least thinking they might like to be able to do that some day, too, but I honestly have a hard time imagining anyone on the Twins’ current roster still being around the next time the Twins are playing postseason baseball. No, not even Joe.
Anyway, here are the lineups that will face off today. Note, Josmil Pinto is DHing today even though Josh Willingham told Gardy he was healthy enough to play. Gardy’s response was that Pinto is swinging the bat better. That had to smart.
| TWINS |
@ |
ATHLETICS |
| Presley, CF | Crisp, CF | |
| Dozier, 2B | Lowrie, SS | |
| Plouffe, 3B | Donaldson, 3B | |
| Arcia, LF | Moss, LF | |
| Pinto, DH | Cespedes, DH | |
| Parmelee, 1B | Reddick, RF | |
| Mastroianni, RF | Barton, 1B | |
| Florimon, SS | Vogt, C | |
| Fryer, C | Sogard, 2B | |
| _De Vries, P | _Gray, S, P |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E | |
| Minnesota | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 7 | 12 | 0 |
| Oakland | 0 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | x | 11 | 11 | 1 |
Oswaldo Arcia, Alex Pressley and Brian Dozier had good games today. The good news is that those three guys may actually have a shot at being key contributors next year. The bad news is that, thanks to pitchers that may also be part of the team next year, seven runs was not enough to win.
Up next, the Twins get to lay down for the Detroit Tigers.