{"id":281630,"date":"2024-04-22T09:26:29","date_gmt":"2024-04-22T14:26:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=281630"},"modified":"2024-04-23T08:26:06","modified_gmt":"2024-04-23T13:26:06","slug":"changes-may-come-for-varland-and-the-twins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/?p=281630","title":{"rendered":"Changes May Come for Varland and Twins"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Minneapolis – The problem with Louie Varland<\/a> for much of this season had been that he was throwing too many hittable strikes in two-strike counts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The problem on Sunday was that he was no longer throwing strikes at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The slumping Twins are now losers of six of their last seven after dropping a 6-1 series finale<\/a> to the Tigers at Target Field, already sinking them to 7-13 and an eight-game deficit in the American League Central<\/a>. As part of that, there no longer appears to be any leeway for the struggling Varland, who looked about as far from himself as ever in another tough start.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this point, manager Rocco Baldelli would no longer commit to Varland making his next start in turn — and, with the need for quick wins growing more urgent, change could be coming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is urgency here,\u201d Baldelli said. \u201cI mean, we can\u2019t play like this, pitch and play like this, and think things are just going to be fine. And our guys know it\u2019s not just going to be fine. We\u2019re going to have to do things. We\u2019re going to have to be open to making roster moves and finding new ways to use players and figure some things out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Twins do have Simeon Woods Richardson ready to step into a rotation spot, coming off a stellar six innings<\/a> in a spot start in an April 13 doubleheader in Detroit. Three of Woods Richardson\u2019s four Triple-A starts have been solid, and, at this point, Minnesota simply needs more consistent results than what Varland has given in his opportunity to start.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI mean it\u2019s everything I asked for, I trained for this offseason and going into camp,\u201d Varland said. \u201cHad the opportunity right in front of me, and, I mean, it\u2019s just not ideal how it\u2019s been going.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking at the quality of the actual pitches Varland has been using this season — which have largely been up from last year — the recipe appears to be there for him to have success, but the Twins might not be able to afford to wait for him to figure it out up here, as they keep digging a deeper and deeper hole in the absence of Royce Lewis<\/a> and Carlos Correa<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sunday brought no signs of Varland getting any closer — and, in many ways, it was a version the Twins hadn\u2019t even seen before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He certainly seems to be feeling the concern from this slow start that has seen him allow 17 earned runs in 16 2\/3 innings this season, for a 9.18 ERA in four starts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYeah, absolutely,\u201d Varland said. \u201cIt\u2019s pretty easy to overthink. I try not to, but I think it\u2019s human.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Typically a strike-throwing machine, Varland instead fell behind in the count against 13 of the 15 hitters he faced while issuing four walks — matching a career high — and a hit-by-pitch, failing to complete the third inning. He was chased by a two-run blast from Buddy Kennedy on one of the pitches Varland got into the zone that ended up middle-middle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Minneapolis – The problem with Louie Varland for much of this season had been that he was throwing too many hittable strikes in two-strike counts. The problem on Sunday was that he was no longer throwing strikes at all. The slumping Twins are now losers of six of their last seven after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":281632,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-281630","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281630","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=281630"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281630\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":281686,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/281630\/revisions\/281686"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/281632"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=281630"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=281630"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/csinewsnow.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=281630"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}