Five key takeaways from the Twins’ season-opening sweep of the Royals

KANSAS CITY, MO - MARCH 30: Byron Buxton #25 of the Minnesota Twins runs against the Kansas City Royals on March 30, 2023 at Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, Missouri. (Photo by Brace Hemmelgarn/Minnesota Twins/Getty Images)
By Aaron Gleeman
Apr 3, 2023

Starting pitching. Lineup depth. Defense. Base running.

Those are the four areas the Twins focused on improving in the offseason, and all four were on display in a season-opening three-game sweep of the Royals in Kansas City that included back-to-back shutout wins to begin a season for the first time in team history.

Let’s look at some of the highlights and key takeaways from a 3-0 start that has the Twins sitting alone atop the AL Central after opening weekend.

Starting strong

Starting pitchers Pablo López, Sonny Gray and Joe Ryan combined to allow just one run over 16 1/3 innings, impressive early returns from a rotation the Twins have banked on being significantly improved this season.

López threw 5 1/3 shutout innings Thursday, using overpowering raw stuff to overcome shaky fastball command. He averaged 95.1 mph with his fastball, up from 93.6 mph for the Marlins last season, and the new “sweeper” breaking ball he learned this spring is already getting swings-and-misses, like his elite changeup. It’s easy to see why López got the Opening Day assignment for his new team.

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Gray’s five shutout innings Saturday were more of a struggle. He seemed to lack fastball command, relying heavily on off-speed pitches in his first two trips through the Royals’ lineup. Gray issued four walks versus just one strikeout and had jams with multiple runners on base in the second, third and fourth innings, but he wriggled out of trouble all three times with a lot of defensive help.

Ryan gave up a solo homer to Edward Olivares in the second inning Sunday to snap the pitching staff’s season-opening scoreless streak at 19 2/3 innings but later settled into a groove on the way to six innings of one-run ball. He allowed only two more hits, struck out six and made good on his spring training plans to rely less on his fastball, throwing 20 split-changeups and 16 sweepers.

Now the baton is passed to Tyler Mahle and Kenta Maeda, the two members of the rotation with health question marks. They’ll kick off a three-game series against Luis Arraez and the Marlins in Miami, with López scheduled to face his old teammates in the finale Wednesday.

State of the lefty bats

Jorge Polanco and Alex Kirilloff are on the injured list, Max Kepler was 0-for-13 in his return to the leadoff spot and Nick Gordon went hitless in the series as well, but Trevor Larnach and Joey Gallo picked up the slack for the Twins’ left-handed hitters in Kansas City.

Larnach went from fighting to make the team in spring training to batting cleanup in each of the first three games, and the 2018 first-round pick responded by going 5-for-11 (.455) with three walks and a lot of good, patient plate appearances. His ability to work counts and drive pitches to the opposite field have always stood out. Now he just needs to stay healthy.

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Gallo was held in check through the first two games, going 0-for-6 with four strikeouts, but Sunday the Twins got their first taste of the all-or-nothing slugger’s upside. He narrowly missed hitting the Twins’ first homer of the season in the fourth inning, settling for a double off the wall. He didn’t miss anything after that, lining homers to right field in the sixth and seventh innings.

Gallo also showed his defensive versatility and fielding chops; the two-time Gold Glove Award-winning outfielder played all three games at first base with Kirilloff out and helped the Twins escape a bases-loaded jam Thursday by starting a rare 3-2-4 double play. His struggles last year are well established, but this is exactly why the Twins made a one-year, $11 million bet on Gallo’s comeback.

Second-base platoon

In all three games, Gordon was in the lineup at second base against a right-handed starter and got replaced by pinch hitter Kyle Farmer when the Royals brought in a left-handed reliever. Going with a Gordon-Farmer platoon is the most logical way to replace the switch-hitting Polanco.

Gordon, a left-handed bat, is a career .271 hitter with a .752 OPS off righties, compared to a .216 average with a .534 OPS off lefties. Farmer, a right-handed bat, is a career .287 hitter with an .836 OPS versus lefties, compared to a .242 average with a .651 OPS versus righties. And by getting aggressive when matchups flip mid-game, manager Rocco Baldelli can turn Gordon and Farmer into bench weapons, too.

Not only did Farmer pinch hit for Gordon against a left-handed reliever in all three games — Amir Garrett twice and Ryan Yarbrough once — but Baldelli also used him in spots when the lefty had to stay in the game because of the three-batter minimum. That’s one advantage of making moves in the middle innings, when opposing managers are sometimes less in tune with the possibility.

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Baldelli got rookie Royals manager Matt Quatraro, his longtime friend, with a double-whammy on Opening Day. Quatraro brought in Garrett to face back-to-back lefties, Gordon and Gallo, in the sixth inning. Garrett couldn’t be pulled, so Baldelli pinch hit Farmer for Gordon and righty Donovan Solano for Gallo. Farmer walked, Solano lined an RBI single, and the Twins led 2-0.

Farmer also came off the bench Saturday to deliver an RBI sacrifice fly in a similar situation versus Yarbrough. Expect to see a lot more mid-game moves from Baldelli now that he has some quality bats on the bench, which is another benefit of the depth the Twins spent all offseason stockpiling.

The Buxton Show

Of course, Farmer’s aforementioned RBI sacrifice fly Saturday would have been merely a flyout if not for Byron Buxton. And a lot of things in this series might have been different for the Twins if not for Buxton going 6-for-13 (.462) with a double, a triple and multiple aggressive base-running plays that led to a run. He had two hits in each of the three games.

But it was his decision to tag up from third base on Farmer’s fly ball to shallow center field that showed the type of impact Buxton is capable of even as he works his way back from knee surgery as a designated hitter. Buxton’s speed is what made scoring on the play a possibility, but it was his instincts and willingness to take a risk that made it happen.

Buxton retreated to third base, most likely to fake a tag, but then noticed Royals center fielder Kyle Isbel making the catch flat-footed, not anticipating the need for a throw. So he took off for home as a surprised Isbel lobbed the ball into the infield. Buxton scored without a throw to the plate. He isn’t 100 percent, and may never be, but he can still put on the jets when needed.

It took an overturned safe call on a bang-bang play, but Buxton grounded into a double play Sunday for the first time since Aug. 18, 2020. During his double-play-less streak, five other major-league hitters grounded into at least 40 double plays, led by José Abreu with 52. Buxton hit 55 homers between double plays, an all-time MLB record.

Pace of play

As was the case across MLB during opening weekend, the Twins and Royals played at a brisk pace thanks to the new pitch clock, completing their three games in an average of 2 hours and 28 minutes — 2:32, 2:18 and 2:35.

By comparison, the average Twins game was 3 hours and 7 minutes last season, and only one of the 30 teams (Tigers, 2:58) averaged under three hours.

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Royals designated hitter Franmil Reyes wasn’t thrilled with the automatic strike called against him on Opening Day, but for the most part it was easy for most to forget the pitch clock was even in place. Most pitches were delivered with five or more seconds remaining on the clock, and eliminating a solid half-hour of downtime turned the same amount of overall action into a far more entertaining product.

It was great and is only going to get better because early in the season the kinks are still being worked out.

(Photo of Byron Buxton: Brace Hemmelgarn / Minnesota Twins / Getty Images)

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Aaron Gleeman

Aaron Gleeman is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the Minnesota Twins. He was previously the editor-in-chief of Baseball Prospectus and a senior writer for NBC Sports. He was named the 2021 NSMA Minnesota Sportswriter of the Year and co-hosts the "Gleeman and The Geek" podcast. Follow Aaron on Twitter @AaronGleeman