After such an excellent weekend of baseball, I am willing to overlook some things: Delmon’s outfield play on Sunday and the story behind his big-inning double — Conor Jackson losing his fly ball to left field — for example, because the Twins totally throttled the Diamondbacks to run their winning streak to six games.

And after several seasons of feeling like the Twins, even in good times, were sacrificing outs at the bottom of their batting order (and near the top sometimes, too) Section 220 is calling for a celebration of the force that sparked the Arizona sweep.

That would be the Bottom Feeders, the pesky guys at the bottom of the order who sparked and continued the weekend’s big innings. They are the fish-themed successors to the Piranhas, the 2006 posse that has pretty much scattered to the winds.

In the fish universe, bottom feeders are the ones in the bottom of the water, feeding off whatever comes their way and too pesky to go away. If one of them meets misfortune, there’s another to take his place.

In the Twins universe, Bottom Feeders are the ones at the bottom third of the batting order, feeding off whatever pitches come at them and too pesky to go away. If one of them meets misfortune (Punto… Lamb… Tolbert… Everett… Macri), there’s another (and another) to take his place.

After Justin Morneau’s two-run homer brought home the 2-1 victory in the homestand opener, the Feeders had 21 hits and 15 RBI in 53 at-bats, a .396 average, in the five wins that followed. Delmon, Buscher, Macri and Harris went 12 for 30 (.400) with eight RBI against the Diamondbacks, the leaders in the NL West even though their record is one game worse than the Twins.

The Feeders started Friday night’s six-run rally against Randy Johnson and sustained the big innings in the Saturday and Sunday wins. And you have to think that Brendan Harris, batting eighth and playing shortstop, is starting to make a good case for himself as a shortstop fixture (in the way that Nick Punto did with his surprising play at third base in 2006) and that Buscher/Punto/Macri (who was returned to Roichester yesterday afternoon) at third base is moving underperforming Mike Lamb closer to the end of the bench.

Even Delmon reached base six times in three games this weekend. Yes, there are still too many dreadful at-bats and his outfield bumbles Sunday (a terrible jump on Jackson’s single in the second and the two-base error on a single in the fourth) can’t be tolerated with a team that’s hitting on most of its other cylinders right now and challenging for first place again. But find me a team out there right now without an issue.

With the Twins facing right-handers for the three games in San Diego this week, we can expect that the Bottom Feeder’s warm-up act, No. 6 batter Jason Kubel, will move from DH to left field and Young can try again to figure things out from the bench. What I hope is that young Mr. Young sees teammates who may be playing a bit above their heads right now, and who make up for their shortcomings with the kind of hustle and smarts that can trump opponents who have more of this or more of that on their rosters.

Delmon is fortunate right now that his teammates are playing at a level that allows them to carry his current lack of power and defensive mediocrity. The top of the fifth inning was an example, when (trailing 3-0, with two runs scoring because of Young’s error) Senor Smoke Free gave up two singles before Mauer picked the runner off second and Morneau started (and finished) a ground ball double play. Those are the sequences pulled off by winning teams. In the bottom of the inning, the Twins came up with their five-run rally.

Big inning, big win, big sweep.

I have trust that, in due time, Delmon will show off the skills that made him the centerpiece of the Tampa Bay trade. I really do. But if that doesn’t happen and he meets an unfortunate fate, there will be another Bottom Feeder to take his place.

other people are here too

This entry was posted on Monday, June 23rd, 2008 at 8:16 am and is filed under From the Dome. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.