Talker: Twins in fun, awkward position

On July 30, barely a week ago, the Twins made an early-morning trade of lefthanded pitcher Jaime Garcia to the Yankees. Garcia, who made just one start (in a victory) for the Twins after being acquired from Atlanta when the Twins were buyers, was suddenly dispatched after a rough week that turned them into sellers.

At the end of that Sunday, after the Twins had blown a 5-0 lead in a 6-5 loss to the A's, they were 50-53 — and a full seven games behind Cleveland in the American League Central and five games behind Kansas City (with two other teams to climb over) in the race for the second wild-card spot.

A rational person playing the percentages — a description that we must conclude describes Twins bosses Derek Falvey and Thad Levine — would have looked at that situation and decided this season just wasn't meant to be. A day later, right at the trade deadline, the Twins dealt away closer Brandon Kintzler — a free agent at the end of this season, but a reliever good enough to make this year's AL All-Star team. It was a pretty clear message that management had turned the page to 2018 and beyond.

The Twins lost their next game in San Diego to fall to 50-54. What followed, though, was a modest surge: five wins in the next seven games, including three in a row in comeback fashion over the past three games. The Royals, who had been red-hot when the Twins decided to sell, lost seven of nine. Nobody else in the wild-card race has really distinguished themselves.

Suddenly, after just one pretty good week, the Twins woke up Wednesday 1.5 games back, albeit as part of a cluster of six teams all within two games of one playoff spot.

Per MLB.com, at that point the Twins still had just a 6.9 percent chance of reaching the postseason — a long shot, almost certainly as a wild card, to reach what is now a one-game playoff with the other wild-card team. But it happened so suddenly — as quickly as the Twins had disappeared, they reappeared — that they are now in a fun and awkward position.

The fun part is nobody expects anything of the Twins at this point, and the team appears to be playing with a certain attitude that is both loose and determined as a result. That can be a winning mix.

If the Twins come up short of the playoffs — which is still the very likely outcome — there will be a nagging curiosity among fans (and maybe even players themselves) what might have happened if they hadn't suddenly become sellers and perhaps even added another piece or two.