Wednesday, May 11, 2011

The hail you say

More hailstones than hits for the Twins at Target Field.
Another embarrassment for the Twins on Tuesday night. So many things going wrong this season ...

I'm going to set aside Francisco Liriano's failure for now, because his stats won't change in the next few days, and focus instead on Michael Cuddyer, because his stats may.

This seems an improbable stat, but it's still true: Cuddyer has three home runs and just four RBIs. He has driven in exactly one of his teammates, and, according to Howard Sinker of the Star Tribune, that came on a groundout.

According to Baseball Reference this morning, he has 62 plate appearances on the season with men on base -- 55 official at-bats, six walks, one HBP. He has nine hits for a .162 batting average with men on base, and none of those hits have driven in anybody. He is just 3-for-29 with men in scoring position -- .103 batting average, .103 slugging percentage.

Cuddyer is not, never has been, a huge offensive producer. He drove in more than 100 runs one season, more than 90 another, more than 80 in two other seasons. That's not particularly impressive for a right fielder/first baseman who generally hits in the middle of the lineup. Still, combined with his non-statistical contributions as a team leader and his willingness to shift positions, he's been a valuable component of the Twins for the past decade.

But this is improbably bad.

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