Twins still strikeout kings: Way too much taking and not enough swinging

Vikings customers will gather in the ZygiDome to do their monotonous pregame “Skol” cheer for the home opener, absorb the action, and then spend the rest of the week discussing what they are convinced they have learned.

Twins customers have only 24 hours to do the same, and that’s based on the home opener being played on schedule, and not pushed back a day by unfavorable weather.

On Thursday, the Twins opened their 15th season in Target Field, and 24 hours later, witnesses can state the most positive element of the experience was the tolerable weather: 48 degrees and sunny, not bad for early April.

Considering one ballgame makes up 0.62% of an MLB regular season, in contrast to one NFL game being 5.88% of the same, we still managed to perceive quite a bit about our defending AL Central titlists on Thursday.

Such as:

• There was a strong suspicion the exuberance witnessed last October when the Twins ended their record-shattering postseason futility was fueled by a younger crowd that decided to stop in, get loud and then look for the next entertainment option.

These were not 10,000 sudden converts to the wonders of the Grand Old Game. And the fact the Twins missed a sellout by almost 3,000 with the announced crowd of 35,595 on Thursday ... well, we might see you sometime this summer, you rowdy youths, if you don’t choose to put on a scarf, go to a soccer game and sing.

• A year ago, we were already celebrating the wonders of the new pitch clock that forced the pitchers and hitters to get moving. Some of us were so giddy we treated it as a cure-all for baseball’s pace-of-play woes.

One year later, I was in the back row of the press box, bellowing under my breath, “Swing the bat, dummies; you’re a disgrace to Yogi Berra.”

This game took 2 hours, 57 minutes, with a combined 14 hits, six runs and only four walks. And this was with Cleveland, a powerless team that puts its emphasis on contact.

The Twins appeared to be pushing fully the 2023 philosophy: Strike or not, don’t swing until it’s a pitch that can be driven … until you get to two strikes.

On Thursday, with Eddie Julien, that carried over to three strikes — called out three times, but also delivering a solo home run the opposite way to left field.

The instruction in this opener was that big-league baseball has a problem that a pitch clock can’t cure:

Way too much taking and not enough swinging.

There’s no solution for that — and certainly not the computerized strike zone the modern thinkers believe is needed. That would create a tighter zone and fewer swings.

• There was fear the loss of Joey Gallo would prevent the 2024 Twins from taking a run at last season’s major league-record 1,654 strikeouts. Carlos Santana, soon to turn 38, walks way too often to be a suitable veteran presence to replace Joey the Whiff.

Thursday, though, the Twins reached that magic number of 15 strikeouts in Game 6. They had 15 games of 15 or more strikeouts last season, with three of those benefiting from K’s in extra innings.

We’ll get a good read on this lineup’s record potential Monday through Wednesday when the mighty L.A. Dodgers are at Target Field. The Twins played three games in L.A. last season and had 38 strikeouts (15, 12 and 11).

Follow Thursday’s game plan, fellas, and you can top that.

• There’s been a popular theory by local baseball pundits that the Twins remain the logical repeat winners in the AL Central, due to their lineup and the overall weakness of the division.

That logic went out the window when Royce Lewis hobbled around second base in the opener. He’s potentially out for a couple of months.

In the meantime, Detroit has Spencer Torkelson, Riley Greene and other excellent young talent in the lineup. The Guardians are the same team that hung around last year, with healthier pitching.

And Kansas City — coming off 56-106 — has greatness in shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. and a superior rotation to the Twins’.

The Twins, with this thin pitching and no Lewis, are better than the Mighty Whiteys of Chicago. And that could be it.