While the Angels still have the only winning road record among the American League contenders, there last road trip wasn't so impressive.  In Cleveland they won only 1 out of 3 games and in Tampa they did the same.  However, had it not been for some late heroics from the streaking Garret Anderson, they were in danger of being swept by the AL East leading Rays.  One of the noticeable differences between the their last 6 games is how many runs they have scored.  At the All-Star break the Angels made a surprise move to trade for Atlanta slugger Mark Texiera, in a move that was supposed to patch up their last remaining weakness.  Still, the offense might be reverting back to it's previous ways.  After scoring an average of 6.6 runs in 24 games since the break, the Angels have scored more than 4 just once in their last six.  The Angels are still by all means probably the best team in the league and will continue to ride their stellar pitching and the always solid defense.  This of course is the same formula the Twins are said to be committed to be following, but certainly less evident this 2008 season.

Keys to the series:

1. Continue to keep their offense at bay.  In my mind their sluggers Mark Teixeira, Vladimir Guerrero and Torii Hunter are going to do what they do.  The best strategy is to keep their smaller fish off the base paths.  Hunter and Guerrero can be beaten and we certainly did a decent job in the opening series, however don't let Teixeira beat you (hopefully we learned from Manny in Boston and Ibanez in Seattle).

2. Attack their pitching early.  The Angels have arguably the best rotation in the majors right now even without Kelvim Escobar.  For some reason or another our current offense does well against right-handers with hard fastballs and good curves (see Justin Verlander, Ben Sheets, Josh Beckett and John Lackey).  They'll set a good precedent by going after Lackey early.  Joe Saunders was physically banged up in his last start and though Jon Garland got us good earlier this year, we've had good success versus him in the past.  As far as Ervin Santana goes, that might be more up to Kevin Slowey than the offense.

3. Big start for Scott Baker.  Scott Baker has had several opportunities to solidify himself as the teams ace going into the stretch run and certainly going into 2009.  However he's fallen short as off late.  A solid 7+ inning start from him would go a long way towards taking the reigns of the rotation.

4. Continue to limit bullpen workload.  The bullpen has been taxed lately and now there a man shorter than they were a day ago.  Albeit not the biggest loss, but there's not a whole lot of help if a starter can't get into the 6th inning.  For Glen Perkins that might mean breaking out the curve the 3rd time through the order to give them another look, for Nick Blackburn that means continuing to mix all the pitches and for Slowey that means attacking the bottom half of the zone. 

5.  Keep pouring on the offense.  Nick Punto had a really bad stretch there but has hit well in his last couple of games.  With Alexi Casilla back that means Punto will go back to the 8-hole and hopefully provide some depth to the lineup.  Punto's better on the field but Brendan Harris has been both good and clutch in August at the dish so we'll see who gets the bulk of the playing time.  Also, the other development to watch will be the Delmon Young.  How hurt is he and did that play into his terrible showing against the A's?  Either way we could use his bat.

6. Who's the hero?  The Twins will certainly need some magic to squeak out some road wins against the best team in the league.  The Twins are a unique team because really, every man counts and every guy in this lineup has taken turns coming up with big hits.  Who's turn is it?