(Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)
The Twins ended the month of May bathed in the blinding light of Joe Mauer's unbelievable return from the DL. His unearthly line of .414/.500/1.338 along with 11 home runs went a long way to cover for the rest of the team's woes.
The Twins entered June two games under the .500 mark, and 4.5 games out of first place in the division. They played June at three games over .500 and basically kept pace with the division leaders, despite Detroit's surge.
Of the Twins' 12 losses last month, half were one-run losses and nine of the 12 were by two runs or fewer. Depending on how much you believe in luck, that will either be incredibly encouraging, since luck tends to regress to the mean, or incredibly depressing, because you know teams tend to make their own luck.
What ought to encourage everyone heading forward is the fact that the Twins have cut bait on those most directly responsible for their languishing near the .500 mark. Jesse Crain was sent to Rochester, Louis Ayala was designated for assignment, and Sean Henn has seen his role reduced (hopefully he'll join the other two soon).
Those three combined for five of the Twins 12 losses, three by Henn alone.
As they make the turn into the second half of the season, here are a few guys who helped lead the team this month.
Francisco Liriano
This was Liriano's best month so far by nearly all measures. He pitched more innings than any month before, yet posted his lowest monthly ERA, due in no small part to the fact that he got his highest number of ground balls in 2009.
Liriano got most of his work in on the road, an area of great weakness for the Twins, yet consistently put them in a position to win. In fact, the Twins won all but one of Liriano's starts in June and won all of his road starts.
He lowered his ERA in every June start and may have finally turned the corner. As I mentioned in an earlier piece, Liriano is a chronic late starter. That it took him this long to get going is unfortunate, but if he truly has turned the corner, the Twins will be a much better team for it.
Brendan Harris
Harris has two major groups of supporters: those that really like him and those that just hate Nick Punto. Due in no small part to Punto's nagging rib injury, Harris was allowed to start every game in a month for the first time since he came to the team.
As much as Gardy may have wanted to pull him out, Harris showed stronger defense than Nick Punto and represents a clear upgrade at the plate. His monthly line of .305/.345/.716 was good enough to earn him the second spot in the order on a fairly consistent basis.
What is most impressive about Harris' start to the season has been his defense. Last year he posted a -5.9 UZR at short. By comparison, Nick Punto slotted in at 17.9, which just gave the coaches all the more reason to keep writing his name into the lineup.
This season, Harris is at a 14.2, an improvement of nearly 20 defensive runs. Punto has regressed to a -2.8, and the Twins (thankfully) have a new starting shortstop.
Jason Kubel
Poor Jason Kubel played a lot more left field in June than he was planning on. Interleague play forced the DH into the outfield and while no one will confuse him for Carlos Gomez in the field, no one will confuse the two at the plate either.
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