They love the night life

The Twins got just two hits in Sunday's loss. This is just an extreme manifestation of a continuing trend — they can't hit in day games.

They've played 25 day games so far — 92 runs, 10th in the AL. (and one of the teams below them, the Angels, have scored six fewer runs in five fewer day games.) That's 3.68 runs per game — and remember, they had 20 runs in one day game. Ignore that bizarre one, and they have 72 runs in 24 day games, exactly 3 runs per game.

They've played 46 night games — 249 runs, second in the AL. That's 5.41 RPG.

In the daytime, the Twins have a 2.42 batting average, a .316 on-base percentage, a .369 slugging percentage, and a .682 OPS. All these percentages rank between 10th and 12th in the 14-team American League.

At night: .289 BA (first); .361 OPB (second); .461 SLG (second); .822 OPS (second).

One can come up with a variety of surmises on why this is happening — a weak bench, players not getting sufficient rest, just a fluke — but it sure looks like a problem.

300-win lefties and other old themes

The Monday print column was a collection of trivia about the six left-handed pitchers with 300 wins.

It was, at one point, going to be an attempt to rank Randy Johnson and Tom Glavine, but ESPN.com's Rob Neyer, Jayson Stark and Jim Caple did it better than I was going to (and at greater length). My only quibble with their work is that Tom Glavine (above) didn't get a mention. If they can consider the likes of Carl Hubbell, Whitey Ford, Eddie Plank and Sandy Koufax — if only to dismiss them — they should have cited Glavine.

Glavine is Warren Spahn writ small — a consistent winner who had a fastball more noted for its command than its velocity and the ability to change speeds. They even spent the bulk of their careers with the same franchise. There's no way I'd argue that Glavine was superior to Spahn — 305 wins is impressive, but still 58 behind Spahn — but still.

* The Twins offense in day games after Sunday's LOB festival: 72 runs in 19 games, 3.79 runs per game.

* NUN Jamie Hoffmann had a hit last week. That's the good news. The bad news is he went 1-for-10, mostly as a pinch hitter, and his batting average is .190.

They only come out at night

One of the reasons for the Twins' inconsistent play is that they simply haven't hit in day games.

They've played 18 day games so far, in which they've scored 70 runs — 3.89 per game. And that's deceptively high, because it includes their 20-1 shellacking of the Chicago White Sox on May 21. Remove that one, and they've got 50 runs in 17 day games — 2.91 runs per game.

At night: 39 games, 210 runs — 5.38 per game.

As a team, the Twins are hitting .242-.320-.363 in the day time, .287-.359-.460 at night.

The pitching staff has also been better in the daytime, but not to this extent (4.39 ERA day, 4.75 night). As a result, the Twins are 5-13 in day games, 23-16 at night.

Some — Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Jason Kubel — are doing well during business hours, but even they are hitting better when the sun goes down.

And some ... Well, Denard Span in the daytime has an OPS of .521, .898 at night. Joe Crede is .615 in the day, .811 at night. Michael Cuddyer is .681 day, .943 night. Mike Redmond — a big part of his job is catching day games — .445 day, .823 night. Brendan Harris, .604, .790.

And Carlos Gomez, Delmon Young, Alexi Casilla, Nick Punto — these guys haven't hit at any hour.

Is there a solution? The obvious initial theory is that some of these guys need the Dan Gladden treatment — Tom Kelly seldom played Gladden day game after a night game. But TK wasn't playing with a four-man bench in those days. Ron Gardenhire doesn't have as many options.

It's possible that all this is fluke anyway, that Cuddyer, Crede and Co. will eventually hit during the day.

But right now, the sun is not their friend.