It has to turn around at some point, right? For the second day in a row, the Twins looked lifeless against the Orioles as they lost 8-2 on Saturday night.
Francisco Liriano started the game very well as he struck out the side in the bottom of the 1st, but then everything fell apart after that. Adam Jones took him deep to make it 1-0 in the 2nd, then the O's tacked on two more runs in the 3rd with the aid of a Josh Willingham "fielding" error. I put "fielding" in quotes because Willingham didn't even touch the ball, but still, he turned a routine single to left into a two-base hit and a run scored for the Orioles. Liriano would be knocked out after 4 innings, allowing 6 runs and 8 hits.
On the offensive side, the Twins put together a few threats but couldn't push across a run until it was too late. In the top of the 2nd, they had runners at 1st and 3rd with 2 outs but Alexi Casilla tapped out to the catcher. There were runners at 1st and 2nd in the 4th with nobody out, but Chris Parmelee fouled out and Danny Valencia grounded into a double play to end the threat.
It took until the 8th inning for the Twins to finally score against O's starter Tommy Hunter, and even then, their runs were scored on consecutive force outs. After they got their two runs, the Twins tried building another rally that same inning, but Willingham struck out looking with two runners on base.
Liam Hendriks apparently has the stomach flu or food poisoning or something that would look awful on TV, so Anthony Swarzak gets the start Sunday. I also heard that it's very likely that Ryan Doumit will be catching.
Studs
Justin Morneau (2 for 4, 2B)
Duds
Josh Willingham (2 K, 2 fielding errors), Danny Valencia (0 for 4, 4 LOB), Francisco Liriano (4 IP, 8 H, 6 R), Jared Burton (1 IP, 2 HR)