Lest you think all it takes is a one-game winning streak — one salvaged in Seattle by Denard Span’s defense and bat, in eerily similar fashion to the series in Sea-town just a few weeks back — for us to think about the Twins in the playoffs again, rest assured this is something we’ve been thinking about for a good week or two now. Take a look at the Twins’ starting rotation: the ERAs of Kevin Slowey, Scott Baker, Nick Blackburn, Francisco Liriano and Glen Perkins range from 3.74 to 3.96 — incredibly similar. Indeed, unlike past seasons, we can never remember who is pitching for the Twins on a given night because, in many cases, they seem interchangeable.

The question is: if the playoffs started today (which they don’t) and the Twins were in them (which they would not be), who would be the odd pitcher out of what would presumably be a four-man playoff rotation? Obviously a lot can happen between now and the start of October — including this being a moot point because of a failure to make the playoffs or four starters really carrying the load while one falters down the stretch — so if you want, think of this as a way to unofficially rank the strengths of the staff members as the pitchers stand now at the end of August.

For our money: Liriano is obviously in the playoff mix at this point because his ERA was inflated by his early-season stint and because he has the greatest ability to throw goose eggs on the board. Beyond that, it’s kind of a matchup crapshoot. Perkins has been very good and has the best record of the bunch but gives up a fair number of hits compared to Baker and Slowey. Blackburn also has given up a lot of hits, but he also has kept the ball in the park better than the other three.

Bottom line, of course, is that the young starters have greatly exceeded expectations and are one of the main reasons we can even have this hypothetical conversation. That said, who would be the odd man out if you had to pick right now?

Fasola-link! The myth of multi-tasking.

(And those of you who don’t like the political talk can thank us for not delving into Joe Biden’s speech or Norm Coleman’s TV ads).

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 28th, 2008 at 8:42 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.