We're only hours away from meaningful baseball, and the Minnesota Twins are already feeling disrespected. A quick look around some of the major sport sites and their predictions for 2007 show the Twins as being a fourth place team in the AL Central. What the Twins want to know is how a team with a batting champion, the reigning AL MVP, a 2-time Cy Young winner, and a terrific bullpen is going to suck so bad.
"Man, what is that?" Twins outfielder Rondell White said. "There are people who try to overanalyze way too much."
"Especially when we won the division last year," White said. "People have too much time on their hands." "We think we're OK, and we're seeded fourth," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "There better be some darn good teams if we're seeded fourth."
You would think that the Twins would be used to it by now. Even when they were clearly the best team in the AL Central over the last few years, they were still doubted by many of the experts. Hell, last year everybody had them finishing in fourth place too, and they won the division.
The difference this season is that there really are some major questions in the starting rotation. Johan Santana is Johan Santana, so no worries there, but after him there are a few questions. Carlos Silva had a bad spring, and until his last start didn't have his sinker. There's also Ramon Ortiz and Sidney Ponson who if judging by their performance the last few seasons, don't provide much hope.
Without Brad Radke and Francisco Liriano, the Twins are going to have to rely more heavily on their bullpen, and that could start to wear on them as the season progresses. When you combine all of that with the fact they play in the AL Central, a lot of the doubts about the Twins this season are justified.
It's just up to the Twins to go out and prove us all wrong again, which if they do, won't really come as a surprise to anyone.