Before we begin, let me briefly describe the types of notable Minnesota Twins seasons:

Good Times Had By All: The team kicks butt. Maybe it doesn't end with a World Series, but it mostly consists of the Twins playing well and vanquishing their opponents. EXAMPLES: 1965, 1991, 2006, 2010

Fun, Plucky Underdogs: A Twins team we did not expect much from manages to outperform their expectations and contend for a playoff spot. Sometimes, it's a prelude to great things; sometimes, you look at the roster after the season and wonder how the heck that team got close to the playoffs. EXAMPLES: 2001, 2008, 2015, the season in Little Big League

PLAYOFFS?!: Just like the previous entry, only the team steeped in mediocrity somehow squeaks into a playoff spot. Very similar to the Plucky Underdog teams as being tons of fun to root for and also giving lots of hilarious players lots of playing time. EXAMPLES: 1987, 2009, 2017

Dumpster Fires: Maybe they were supposed to be good, or maybe not, but ultimately everyone important falls down a manhole and good players play like bad players and it is a (often hilarious) disaster. EXAMPLES: 2011, 2016, much of the 80s and 90s

This year was none of those. It was just a sad season where they lost more games than they won, but not a LOT more, and guys got hurt and the manager got fired and Joe Mauer maybe is retiring. This is the worst type of season, not least of all because it's ungodly boring -- the hope of a pennant race is over by June, and there's not any train-wreck "Delmon shat himself in the outfield" style hijinks to keep us entertained. It's just a months-long slog of mediocre-to-bad baseball.

BUT! Even the most depressing, fans-checked-out-by-August seasons still produce statistics. And where there are statistics, there is some idiot like me looking at them on Baseball Reference to see if any of them are funny. Friends, I invite you to join me in appreciating these statistics, which have been lovingly gathered over a period of several months and aged in artisanal binders and databases until they are ready to compare to the Cleveland Spiders and Bartolo Colon.

HERE WE GO...

(usual disclaimer that all stats are from 2018 unless otherwise noted and also I calculated some of them by hand so if they are wrong what do you care you didn't pay to read this article anyway)

(also here is the link to the midseason edition of this thing, which probably has links to earlier years but this was the type of season where apathy prevents me from actually looking that up)

Twins leader in ERA: Mitch Garver
Twins leader in OPS: Kyle Gibson

Twins leader in doubles: Eduardo Escobar
Twins leader in intentional walks: Eduardo Escobar
Last date Eduardo Escobar was on the Twins' roster: July 27

Are you going to reuse the stat where the Twins have a worse batting average than the 1899 Cleveland Spiders: Yes

Team Batting average
2018 Twins: .250
1899 Cleveland Spiders: .253

OPS
Byron Buxton: .383
St. Louis Cardinals Pitchers: .397

Stolen base success rate (career)
Joe Mauer: 73.2%
Kirby Puckett: 63.8%
Rod Carew: 65.4%
Cesar Tovar: 67.7%
Dan Gladden: 70.4%

OPS+ (career)
Joe Mauer: 124
Kirby Puckett: 124

Batting average
Willians Astudillo: .357
Kirby Puckett's career high (1988): .356

Triples
2018 Twins: 22
Cristian Guzman (2000): 20

OPS
Logan Morrison: .644
Nick Punto (career): .646
Miguel Sano: .679
Luis Rivas (career): .681

Isolated power
Logan Forsythe (with Twins): .034
Three Finger Brown (career): .042
Old Hoss Radbourn (career): .045

Batting Average
Taylor Motter (with Twins): .053
Bartolo Colon (career): .084

Twins pitchers with more than five starts and a worse ERA than Bartolo Colon (5.78): 0
Is this the end for Bartolo: I hope not

Stolen base success rate
Max Kepler: 44.4%
Jim Thome (career): 48.7%
Jorge Polanco: 50.0%
Kent Hrbek (career): 58.7%

OPS (career)
Willians Astudillo: .887
Harmon Killebrew: .884

OPS+
Max Kepler: 96
Max Kepler (2017): 95
Max Kepler (2016): 96

Strikeout rate
Miguel Sano: 38.5%
All-time Strikeout Leader Reggie Jackson (career): 22.7%
2018 Strikeout Leader Yoan Moncada: 33.4%
Single-season Strikeout Record Holder Mark Reynolds (2009): 33.7%

ERA
Willians Astudillo: 45.00
Chris Giminez: 45.00
Astudillo & Giminez's rank, out of 1057 pitcher seasons in Twins history: 1054th/1055th
So, it could be worse: Yes
Carl Willis (1995): 94.50
Me (1993, Babe Ruth baseball): 135.00

Batting average
Logan Morrison: .186
Jim Kaat (career): .185

Batter seasons in Twins history (300+ plate appearances): 532
2018 Logan Morrison's rank in batting average: 532nd
Should the Twins pick up his option: Probably not

Save percentage
2018 Twins: 55%
LaTroy Hawkins (career): 66.8%

Strikeouts per nine innings
Jose Berrios: 9.5
Jake Odorizzi: 8.9
Johan Santana (career): 8.8
I think the game has changed somewhat: Yes

Sacrifice hits
2018 Minnesota Twins: 19
Babe Ruth (1930): 21
I think the game has changed somewhat: Yes

Pythagorean record
2018 Twins: 77-85
1987 Twins: 79-83