The Twins went into Baltimore last week and were thoroughly outclassed by the Orioles, with their collection of tremendous young talent.
They were outscored 22-9 in the three-game sweep, with the worst beating suffered in the middle game by Chris Paddack, the pitcher attempting to re-establish himself after a second Tommy John surgery.
The Twins saw him pitch a few innings last fall in the postseason and were impressed. They allowed the tremendously valuable Sonny Gray to walk (to the St. Louis Cardinals for three years and $75 million) and talked up the potential of Paddack to fill a veteran’s spot in the rotation.
Paddack was clobbered for 12 hits and nine runs in 5⅓ innings by the O’s. The one positive heard was that he was willing to go back out there for a few more pitches in the sixth to help out a bullpen that was about to be overused.
On Monday night, Paddack had his fourth start of the season, and first following the Baltimore rout. The opponents were the Chicago White Sox (3-19), establishing themselves very early as a team with a chance to charge past the franchise’s all-time record for losses:
One-hundred six, divided among three managers — Don Gutteridge (87), Bill Adair (six) and the always happy Chuck Tanner (13) — in 1970.
The White Sox arrived at Target Field with seven shutouts already inflicted upon them — one per series. So it’s probably a good idea not to get overly excited over the bounce-back offered by Paddack in this series opener, but consider the ridicule that would have been aimed at the Twins and the pitcher if he had been knocked around by the South Siders.
Rather than that, Paddack went seven innings, struck out 10 and allowed six hits — with zero walks — a 7-0 win. Ronny Henriquez, called up from St. Paul on Monday, needed 47 pitches (20 balls) to get through two innings and the White Sox quickly had hit their shutout ratio (one) per series.
