Reusse: Twins are staggering toward the playoffs using glue and duct tape

Big league baseball has not yet achieved the watered-down status with its playoffs that other major professional leagues have long featured, but it is getting there.

The purity of league champions playing in the World Series ended with divisions in 1969, and then eight teams in 1995, followed by 10 in 2012 and now 12 in 2022.

I weep for the golden afternoons of Oct. 6-7, 1965, with the Twins beating Don Drysdale and Sandy Koufax back-to-back at Met Stadium, and a visiting columnist writing, “What matter of men are these ballplayers from Minnesota?”

Very mortal once our fellas got on the rock-hard surface of Dodger Stadium as it turned out, but to be a young follower of those 102-win Twins, and now decades later to be watching these beat-up Twins try to stagger into a best-of-three wild-card series with virtually no chance to be the American League’s World Series representatives — well, the heart isn’t pumping and the corpuscles aren’t jumping.

Byron Buxton was running the bases and playing center field as we never imagined was again possible, and then on Aug. 12, batting in the fifth inning, he struck out and walked directly to the dugout.

Hip pain, they said. Last time Buxton had leave-the-field hip pain, he was having an excellent season in 2021 and then missed two months. This week it was two half-games of rehab, one ejection by an overly ambitious young umpire in St. Paul, the hip pain was back, and rookies Austin Martin and DeShawn Kiersey Jr. will be sharing center field in Kansas City this weekend.

Carlos Correa was playing the best shortstop ever seen with the Twins, and then he left the lineup after July 12.

He had plantar fasciitis in his right foot. He missed a short time with that in his left foot in 2023, played through it, and then had the tear that oddly brings pain relief with that ailment (which I always claim was introduced to North America’s sports fans when point guard Micheal Williams was forced out of the Timberwolves lineup in the mid-1990s).

Never heard of it, couldn’t spell it, but then Micheal couldn’t spell “Michael,” so we were even.

So why hasn’t Correa kept at it this time, playing and waiting for the tear? He explained that in late August — that the right foot requires more caution because of that serious ankle injury in 2014 that required surgical repair.

Yes, that old ankle surgery that caused both the Giants and the Mets to back off on their $300 million free-agent contract proposals.

And now as Correa continues with a quiet absence, and Willi Castro has filled in adequately (which is not to be mistaken for greatness), you start to think perhaps it wasn’t a flaw in the orthopedic universe that agent Scott Boras imagined as the reason he failed to come up with another $100 million-plus for Correa.

There’s also the loss of the Twins’ third ace, Joe Ryan, after 23 starts and for the rest of the season. And now Simeon Woods Richardson, the surprise of the season, has lost some steam, and the Twins are trying to get to the finish line with two “bona fides” — Pablo López and Bailey Ober — and three suspects in the rotation: rookies Woods Richardson, David Festa and Zebby Matthews.

Let’s take a quick look at the timeline here, Twins:

Sonny Gray was a great starter in 2023 and no attempt was made to fill the massive vacancy. The trade deadline came with the team playing well and the single reinforcement was a wild-pitching reliever who was dropped three weeks later.

You kept Max Kepler, perhaps thinking those last few weeks in 2023 were real — and should have known better. You brought in Manuel Margot as a righty-hitting outfielder, and he’s a modern-day Ron Swoboda, leaps-for-’em and they ain’t there, as Casey Stengel said.

Royce Lewis has been playing for a stretch now, dangerous, but not slump-proof. Edouard Julien — it’s September, he’s back again and maybe has decided it’s better to swing than to take strike three.

We could go on:

Carlos Santana — warrior. Matt Wallner — quite a revival. Jose Miranda — can hit. Griffin Jax — brilliant. Jhoan Duran — nice to have him. Cole Sands — where did this come from? Caleb Thielbar — still lefthanded, only one among 14 pitchers.

Bottom line: Surprisingly good for three months, hanging on with “B” squad now.

Should win in mid-80s, which is more than management deserved after Gray and his 2.79 ERA in 184 innings walked with no plan for a reasonable substitute.

Oh, wait: Chris Paddack, after pitching twice (in 2023 postseason) since a second Tommy John surgery in May 2022, was going to get you 130 competitive innings.

That was the pipe dream.