Minnesota Twins: Brian Dozier is quietly at it again, leading Twins march towards October
By Jason Burke
The Minnesota Twins just placed slugger Miguel Sano on the disabled list over the weekend, but with Brian Dozier getting hot it may not matter.
In the span of a week the Minnesota Twins went from buying ahead of the non-waiver trade deadline, acquiring Jaime Garcia from Atlanta, to trading away Garcia to the New York Yankees and seemingly punting on this season.
Well, turns out that the Twins are in the thick of the playoff race and if the season were to end today they’d be facing the Yanks in New York for a one-game playoff to determine who heads to Houston for the ALDS.
Even with Sano and his team-leading 28 homers and 77 RBI now on the shelf, the Twins have won two straight (six of seven overall) without him and hold a half-game lead over the Los Angeles Angels for the second Wild Card spot entering play on Wednesday. One big reason for this recent surge is Brian Dozier, who is quietly having another one of his second-half offensive explosions. In 36 games since the break, Dozier has hit 13 homers, the same number he had in the first half while playing in 81 contests.
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In the month of August, in which the Twins are 15-7, Dozier has tallied nine bombs, driven in 19 and hit .333 with a .429 OBP. At the rate he’s on now, he could tie his career-high home run mark of 42, which he set last season. Last season Dozier doubled his home run total from the first half (14) to end up with his 42 home run total, batting .291 after the break.
Of course another reason for Minnesota’s recent run is the emergence of Byron Buxton, who is batting .338 with a .378 OBP since the break while collecting four homers and two triples since the break.
In terms of fWAR, only Giancarlo Stanton and Josh Donaldson are having better months than Dozier while Nelson Cruz and (of course) Tim Beckham sit with the same 1.5 wins above replacement total. Dozier’s hot bat has the Twins ranked first in home runs this month with 39, with Max Kepler adding six and Eddie Rosario adding seven to the total.
The Twins pitching staff as a whole has ranked near the bottom of baseball this season, ranking 24th in ERA at 4.74 and 27th in FIP at 4.87, but have moved well up the leaderboard in ERA (3.97,13th) and FIP (4.38, 12th) in August. While the division-leading Indians lead all of baseball in both marks this month, they have been dealing with injuries to key members of their 25-man roster, including Andrew Miller (again), Danny Salazar, Boone Logan and Josh Tomlin, which could catch up to them, much like the Twins, before season’s end.
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The two clubs match up just three more times at the end of the season in Cleveland, so the head-to-head match-ups are just about over, but the Twins will be facing both the Royals and Tigers seven times each. They hold a cumulative 13-11 record against these AL Central foes this season. If the Twins can improve on that mark by a game or two and the Tribe begin to falter after another stretch run of injury woes, then the Twins could have a real shot at the Central, let alone a Wild Card spot.