Byron Buxton says Twins are 'nasty' and 'dangerous'
"We nasty. We dangerous." Those were the words the flew out of Byron Buxton's mouth following Minnesota's 5-1 win over the Los Angeles Dodgers on Tuesday night.
Buxton went 2-for-4 with a walk and a pair of stolen bases in the win, which saw right-hander Bailey Ober outperform Clayton Kershaw to give the Twins their first victory at Dodger Stadiium since 2005.
"It just shows how different we are — our mentality and who we are becoming as a team," Buxton said, according to the Star Tribune. "We didn't go out there today like, 'Oh, Kershaw's pitching.' It was like, 'They're facing the Twins. … You've got to pitch to us. We nasty. We dangerous.' And once we get it clicking, it's going to be way worse."
Buxton's confident claim comes following a four-game stretch where the bats have been firing on all cylinders. Minnesota scored 29 runs in three games against the Cubs, marking a franchise record for most runs in a three-game series at Target Field, and have followed with 14 runs in two games against the Dodgers.
Nasty? Dangerous? Debatable.
This is the same Twins offense that entering play a week ago...
- Had the worst team batting average in all of baseball...
- Had the third-worst team on-base percentage...
- Had the fewest hits in the majors...
- Had the second-lowest contact rate in the majors...
- Was hitting .219 with runners in scoring position...
Over the last seven days (seven games) the Twins are hitting .291/.369/.534 as a team with 12 homers and 18 doubles. Their 47 runs in the past seven days is the most in the big leagues, six more than the next most (Cardinals with 41).
Maybe Buxton is on to something and the past seven days is a sign that they're beginning to click. But he seems to be basing the "nasty" and dangerous" claim on a seven day eruption whereas the Twins' meager offense was based on a much larger sample size of 36 games.
If Buxton is right – and the pitching keeps up its pace as one of the top units in the game – then the Twins really will be a nasty opponent for every other team going forward.
Title: Bring Me The Sports co-owner, editor Email: joe@bringmethenews.com Twitter: @JoeBMTN Education: Southwest Minnesota State University Location: Minneapolis, Minnesota Expertise: All things Minnesota sports Nelson has covered Minnesota sports for two decades, starting his media career in sports radio. He worked at small market Minnesota stations in Marshall and St. Cloud before joining one of the nation's highest-rated sports stations, KFAN-FM 100.3 in the Twin Cities. There, he was the producer of the top-rated mid-morning sports show with Minnesota Vikings announcer Paul Allen. His radio experience helped blossom a career as a sports writer, joining Minneapolis-based Bring Me The News in 2011. Nelson and Adam Uren became co-owners of Bring Me The News in 2018 and have since more than tripled the site's traffic and launched Bring Me The Sports in cooperation with the Sports Illustrated/FanNation umbrella. Nelson has covered the Super Bowl and numerous training camps, NFL combines, the MLB All-Star Game and Minnesota playoff games, in addition to the day-to-day happenings on and off the field of play. Nelson also has extensive knowledge of non-sports subjects, including news and weather. He works closely with Bring Me The News meteorologist Sven Sundgaard to produce a bevy of weather and climate information for Minnesota readers. Nelson helped launch and manage the Bring Me The News Radio Network, which provided more than 50 radio stations around Minnesota with daily news, sports and weather reports from 2011-17.