Danny Valencia refuses to take the blame for Twins' latest loss

CHICAGO - Danny Valencia knows he has a tendency to stand straight when a ball is hit to him at third base. He's working on it, but he doesn't believe it cost the Twins a game Monday night.

"You can't win games without scoring any runs," he said after the Twins' 3-0 loss to the Chicago White Sox at U.S. Cellular Field, and certainly he is correct.

But with one month remaining in a lost season, questionable defense is going to stick out more than another lousy offensive performance against Mark Buehrle. That's why manager Ron Gardenhire was focused on plays his defense didn't make in the Twins' 10th loss in their past 12games.

Valencia, Gardenhire said, probably could have stopped at least one of two hot grounders hit by him at third in the seventh and eighth innings. Both runners scored. If Valencia could curb his tendency to stand straight up before stooping to make a play, maybe one of those is an out.

"That's his mechanics, and we've been trying to get him out of that habit," Gardenhire said. "He stands up. It's just like a pitcher that's dropping his elbow, or a hitter that's hitching. You're trying to get him out of the habit to make him a better fielder and give him more range.

"But he's got bad habits; he just stands up. We're not trying to pick on him."

It seems that way to Valencia, who declined to take any blame for Monday's loss beyond his part in a four-hit performance. He went 1 for 4 with two strikeouts and an infield hit, and was one of two Twins baserunners to reach second.

"There are some plays that could have gone either way," he said. "Like I said, (Kevin) Slowey pitched really well, we just didn't score any runs."
Asked about his fielding mechanics, Valencia said, "It's something I work on, obviously, and it's something I can get better at, obviously, but I don't think it was a factor in tonight's game at all."

The reality is, Minnesota's defense has been bad all season, and all around the horn. The Twins entered Monday's game with 95 errors, third most in the American League, and there was plenty of blame to go around in their latest loss.

Trevor Plouffe, playing just his third game in left field, had trouble tracking Alejandro De Aza's fly ball in the second. The White Sox right fielder reached on a double, stole third and scored on Tyler Flowers' sacrifice fly. The third run scored when Alexei Ramirez came home on a weak chopper to short by Dayan Viciedo.

Valencia charged it but couldn't make the pick. That Viciedo reached safely was no surprise. What was a surprise was he scored on the play, essentially because shortstop Tsuyoshi Nishioka - back in the lineup for the first time in eight games - didn't back up the play.

"Nishi's got to be there," Gardenhire said. "He was right in behind him, then he runs to cover third. He's got to be right there in case Danny misses it. We told him, 'You can't play without the ball.' "

Also consider that Ramirez tagged from first on a fly ball to right because teams know they can run on center fielder Ben Revere's arm. Later in the inning, Nishioka failed to make a swipe tag despite a perfect throw from Rene Rivera when Viciedo stole second.

Some of the Twins' young players may feel like it's nitpicking, especially in a game that featured just four Twins singles, but in a season like this, nitpicking is really all that's left. In that sense, only Slowey's performance stood out for the right reasons.

He held a potent Chicago lineup to two earned runs on six hits and two walks over seven innings.

"If we had made some plays," Gardenhire said, "it could have been a 0-0 ballgame. I think all three runs, really, shouldn't have been out there without us giving them to them."


(twincities.com)