Twins might not deserve it, but AL Central is still right there to be taken

The bad news for the Twins is that there are three teams they have proven incapable of hanging with this season, which is a significant impediment to the ultimate goal of winning a World Series.

Even after Thursday's big win in New York, they finished the year 2-15 against the Yankees, Astros and Dodgers. As Twins manager Rocco Baldelli pointed out in the midst of this week's mostly futile series in the Bronx, those teams win most nights. But they shouldn't win almost every night against a team that considers itself a playoff contender.

The good news for the Twins is that they no longer have to play any of baseball's best teams. They are 67-52 this season against everyone else — including 32-24 against the Guardians, Royals, Angels, White Sox and Tigers, the five teams that account for the final 26 games on their schedule.

Fourteen of those games are against Cleveland or Chicago, the Twins' co-conspirators in a low-speed chase to win the AL Central, including a three-game series starting Friday against the Guardians at Target Field.

As Twins beat writer Megan Ryan and I talked about on Friday's Daily Delivery podcast, this Twins season has been a strange dichotomy.

Propped up by a weak division and a strong early stretch that pushed them as many as 11 games over .500, the Twins have either led or been close to the AL Central lead for virtually the whole season.

But they've also been playing sub-.500 baseball for more than three months, and fans: 1) Have become frustrated with painful losses and some of the tactics deployed along the way; 2) Realize the Twins wouldn't be a contender in any division but the AL Central and are therefore less than fully engaged in watching a playoff pursuit.

If an 83-win team wins a division in the middle of the woods, does it make a sound?

All that said, there's this: An opportunity is just that, and the Twins have one. We can talk about whether they deserve to still be in the playoff race, but the biggest thing that matters is that they are.

If they chug to the finish line with enough acceptable five-inning starts, pieced-together relief efforts and timely hits, they just might win more games than the Guardians or White Sox.

At that point, you could still wonder if the Twins deserved it. But you would know Cleveland and Chicago didn't, and you would still be curious to see if the Twins could finally win a playoff game.