Section 219: Time for Twins to experiment

We really shouldn't be surprised by anything that happens with the Twins over these final six weeks of the season as they try to figure out which of their moving parts should still be in motion as the team careens toward 2013.

The short version is that the Twins are without nearly enough starting pitching, a middle-infield combination, bullpen depth and enough bats on the bench to be taken seriously. There's enough stuff to be sorted out that waiting until the 25-man roster limit disappears on Sept. 1 doesn't give them enough time, which helps to explain the Pedro Florimon-for-Brian Dozier swap at shortstop.

Twins president Dave St. Peter tweeted Tuesday night that he sensed "angst over the Dozier move." Another tweet that flew across my screen complained to a local TV station that the Twins were sending down their best shortstop.

Angst and outrage are not called for. TwinsCentric's Nick Nelson described his play as being "roundly awful for a full three months," and others in the local blogging community have done a good job putting Dozier into context, including this Aaron Gleeman post.

In the office, a colleague called out during Wednesday's loss, "Was Dozier any better than Nishioka?"

Well, in 240 plate appearances last season, Nishioka had a hideous on-base percentage of .278. In 340 this season, Dozier's was .271. (Defensively, despite his errors, Dozier is superior.) The difference, of course, is that the Twins:

1) went halfway around the world in pursuit of Nishioka.

3) committed money that could have gone elsewhere while adhering to the "payroll as a percentage of revenue" mantra.

4) created the mess that Dozier was being asked to cover up.

Given the state of the season, it was fine for the Twins to give Dozier a chance to play through his mistakes, but it's also fine to give a look to Florimon, who comes with defensive skills and no pretense of adding offense, before the rosters expand and the remaining games take on even more of a March-in-Florida feel.

Keep in mind that Scott Diamond's call-up was seen as more of a prayer than a solution earlier this season and that Darin Mastroianni's arrival came only after the arrivals and failures of outfielders KKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKlete Thomas (16 K's in 28 at-bats, if you didn't count) and Erik Komatsu with his 46 OPS+.

Sometimes you try stuff and it works; sometimes you try stuff and get embarrassed. Given the circumstances, you have to be willing to understand both.

The other ongoing tryouts are on the pitching staff. Which members of the Filler D's -- Diamond, Duensing, Deduno and De Vries -- will be serious candidates to start in 2013 and beyond? Diamond, of course, is the best bet, and I want to give Duensing the benefit of the doubt because of the way he's been moved from bullpen to rotation to bullpen to rotation in the last two seasons.

And Deduno is enough of a trip to watch that I can roll with him through the end of the season and then revisit my wildness-driven skepticism.

I'm sharing this statistic only if you promise not to accuse me of comparing Deduno to one of baseball's gods: Nolan Ryan averaged 5.5 walks per nine innings over the first half of his career (when he was barely a .500 pitcher) and then 3.8 over the second half (when he was among the most dominant). It was a different era, but Ryan also had some tiny ERAs while he was handing out lots of walks.

Again, that was NOT a comparison.

But if Deduno can find some command to go with the incredible movement on his fastball...

The bullpen needs help to go with Glen Perkins and Jared Burton. Beyond them, there are no sure things for 2013. The coming weeks will show how many of the young guys are keepers and how much time the Twins will have to expend in scouting and signing the next batch of set-up/middle innings guys.

Here's a list of potential free agents, if you want to play along with the front office.