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First Pitch: 6:15 pm CDT

TV: Twins.TV / ~ / Radio: TIBN, WCCO 830, The Wolf 102.9 FM

“WHOOPS!” – my honest to God reaction to last night’s game.

It’s a toss-up for me between last night and the 7-1 Houston affair; the latter was obviously a larger lead, but it felt like Minnesota needed the win yesterday more. Coming fresh off a series victory over the New York Mets, the Twins rolled into Truist Park and handled the Atlanta Braves for seven extremely solid innings until the wheels came off. Even though fans may have already written off the Chris Paddack start as a loss, it still doesn’t feel good to blow a winnable game.

The Twins now carry a 7-13 record into Saturday night’s game. I find it noteworthy that the Kansas City Royals — who carry into 2025 every bit the playoff aspiration that the Twins do — are locked down in a similar 8-13 hole, just a half-game above Minnesota. If you’d like to believe the Royals will rebound over the next few weeks, there would seem to be just as much reason to hope the Twins can do the same thing.

It’s also notable that the Twins now have an identical record this year as they did in the first 20 games last season. That team also started at a 7-13 clip, losing six of seven to the contending Detroit Tigers and Baltimore Orioles, before rattling off twelve straight wins out of nowhere. That won’t happen again, but that same Twins team was able to keep the pace up after their streak and were 17 games over .500 when the worm turned in late August.

All this to say, it may be getting late early, but there are close competitors off to similar starts, and 142 games left in the season. The series is still up for grabs, and two more wins this weekend could mean consecutive series wins against the Mets and Braves. Wouldn’t that be something?

In pursuit of that outcome, the Twin lineup will face Chris Sale. A year after his decisive bounce-back to a 6-win Cy Young season, Sale has gotten off to a rough start in his age-36 campaign, posting a 6.63 ERA through four starts but is running a 3.66 FIP and inducing plenty of off-speed chase.

This will be his 32nd career start against Minnesota – somehow, he racked up more starts against KC, DET, and CLE than he ever did the Twins. (He has faced the Chicago White Sox six times since being traded away for that notable four-player haul; Victor Diaz was out of minor-league ball by 2017, Luis Alexander played in only nine major-league games, none with Chicago, and Michael Kopech and Yoan Moncada are now both with LA, but on different teams. How is that possible? Also, the doctor was his mother.)

Luke Keaschell, the greatest player I’ve ever seen in my life, gets the nod in the infield this evening. Jonah Bride will also make his first start as a Twin, covering the hot corner. Carlos Correa remains in the lineup; Willi Castro remains absent.

GO TWINS GO!