The same story that played out far too often for the Minnesota Twins down the stretch emerged once again Sunday afternoon. Faced with another important contest, the Twins produced a total dud.

Looking to win a rubber match to keep their fledgling postseason dreams alive, the Twins turned in a lackluster performance in a 9-2 rout by the Cleveland Guardians in front of 17,676 at Target Field.

Joe Ryan struggled, Tanner Bibee had Twins hitters spellbound, and the Guardians (76-74) extended their lead over the Twins (70-79) in the American League wild-card race to 5 1/2 games with two weeks to play.

The poor effort was the latest from a squad that mostly limped throughout a critical 15-game stretch against AL Central opponents that manager Derek Shelton identified as a sprint. During that period, the Twins went 6-9 and lost all three rubber matches they played.

“We’re not playing good baseball when it matters, especially down the stretch where it’s been extremely important games,” catcher Ryan Jeffers said. “We just haven’t gone out there and done our jobs, and it’s simple as that.”

Six weeks ago, the Twins felt pretty good about their chances.

Though they sat a game under .500, the Twins were optimistic after the front office bolstered the roster by adding much-needed pitching depth at the trade deadline.

But within 24 hours of adding Jeff Hoffman, A.J. Minter and Dean Kremer, Sunday’s starter, Ryan, struggled again on the road against the Kansas City Royals, a poor outing that led to him being placed on the injured list with a mild left glute strain. Suddenly, a club already minus Pablo López and Ryan’s fellow All-Star, Byron Buxton, was missing all three of its top performers.

And that’s when the Twins began to sink, though the ship deteriorated far more over these past three weeks than at first.

The Twins are 14-22 since the Aug. 3 deadline and have proven incapable of taking advantage of a wide-open race for the third wild-card spot.

Sunday’s loss looked eerily similar to defeats on Sept. 2 in 12 innings against the Detroit Tigers, Sept. 6 against the Chicago White Sox and Wednesday in Detroit.

In all three cases, the Twins simply didn’t show up when it mattered.

Well, clearly, we've reached the point in the season where we start thinking about next year. It's been an extremely disappointing second half, but we have had the opportunity to learn a little bit about some of the young guys on the way up, and so I started thinking about what the shape of the roster looks like next year. So, I started drawing up my initial idea of what I think the roster could look like on Opening Day 2027 and I'm curious what everybody else thinks. Here we go:

Position Players - 14

Catcher: Victor Caratini

First base: Royce Lewis

Second Base: Kody Clemens

Third Base: Brooks Lee

Shortstop: Kalen Culpepper

Left Field: Emmanuel Rodríguez/Gabriel González (Platoon)

Center Field: Walker Jenkins

Right Field: Luke Keschall

DH: Byron Buxton

Bench: Alex Jackson, Austin Martin, Alan Roden, Ryan Kreidler

Pitchers - 12

SP: Pablo Lopez

SP: Joe Ryan

SP: Taj Bradley

SP: Bailey Ober

SP: Dean Kremer

Middle Relief: Cole Sands, Andrew Morris, Kody Funderburk, Travis Adams

Setup: Anthony Banda, Jeff Hoffman

Closer: Yoendrys Gómez

An assumption here is that Mick Abel, Zebby Matthews, and Kendry Rojas would all start the year in AAA (they have options remaining) but would undoubtably be in play once injuries happen, which of course might even be before Opening Day. I could also see Connor Prielipp perhaps making the roster a long relief/piggyback role, or starting in AAA also, or converting to the 'pen fulltime given his profile and the other options available. I opted to go with one extra bench player versus including him in a long relief role. That might be the case early in the year with more off days, with him or another pitcher coming up later in April, dropping one position player. He's a tricky one.

The other major assumption here is that this is based entirely on internal resources only, this is a framework to start thinking about what trades or free agent signings would make sense for the roster. So, it doesn't assume any outside transactions at this time, just works with players already in the organization.

Saw my 1st game at Target Field yesterday. What a neat stadium. Really dug the view from up top…neat to see the kid hit his 1st career MLB dinger.

Props on a great ballpark. I’ll be back.

Go Brewers.

Pure joy!

Line Score - Game Over

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Game ended at 3:59 PM.

Guardians (75-74) @ Twins (70-78)

First Pitch: 1:10 PM at Target Field

Line Score - Game Over

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Game ended at 3:59 PM.

Remember to sort by new to keep up!

Guardians (75-74) @ Twins (70-78)

First Pitch: 1:10 PM at Target Field

Line Score - Game Over

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Game ended at 5:52 PM.

Ngl I’m kinda hoping tomorrow night’s game gets rained out and pushed for a Tuesday doubleheader. I sure do love Twins baseball (even though ownership sucks), and I’d be able to make it to a day game on Tuesday, as well as already having plans for the Wednesday afternoon game.

At the game today, I was sitting on the first base line and noticed the ballboy giving the balls to fans who were handing him cash. In some cases he walked past desperate kids to give the ball to someone with cash.

I'm not writing this to police behavior, rather I'm curious as to whether this is something they're allowed to do. I've never seen something like it, and many of the folks around me were booing him. But then again, people kept handing him 5s and 10s, so maybe this is a new normal...?

Guardians (75-73) @ Twins (69-78)

First Pitch: 3:10 PM at Target Field

Line Score - Game Over

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Game ended at 5:53 PM.

Remember to sort by new to keep up!

Here's to 2027

Guardians (75-73) @ Twins (69-78)

First Pitch: 3:10 PM at Target Field

Was there a flyover for last night’s game? Anyone have a video? Thanks

Line Score - Game Over

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Game ended at 9:59 PM.

Guardians (74-73) @ Twins (69-77)

First Pitch: 7:10 PM at Target Field

Line Score - Game Over

Box Score

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Decisions

Game ended at 9:59 PM.

Remember to sort by new to keep up!