All the talk here this morning is about A's pitcher Bartolo Colon, who has failed a drug test and has been slapped with a 50-game suspension.

It's the last thing the Bay Area needs after the Bash Brothers, Barry Bonds, BALCO, Melky Cabrera and now Colon.

"They have made some mistakes and they will pay," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said of the recent suspensions.

A couple things from last night:

Righthander Cole De Vries didn't pitch bad at all, giving up two earned runs over 52/3 innings. Give him credit for going to his curveball more to keep hitters off his fastball. Gardenhire, however, pointed out that De Vries has to work at a faster pace.

Gardy is a big believer in pace. Throw the ball over, keep the defense on their toes, get the offense back up to the plate. Everything backs up when a pitcher is working slowly. Tom Kelly used to talk about that, too.

Gardy also said that Trevor Plouffe reacted slowly to the soft liner that deflected off his glove for a hit in the sixth inning. That would have been the third out of the inning. Instead, Derek Norris batted and drove in a run with a single.

Plouffe is batting .069 over his last eight games.

Justin Morneau, owner of a 11-game hitting streak, is getting the day off.

Liam Hendriks is set for his latest audition to be part of the Twins' rotation of the future.

Twins (51-71)

1. Ben Revere, CF
2. Alexi Casilla, 2B
3. Joe Mauer, 1B
4. Josh Willingham, LF
5. Ryan Doumit, DH
6. Matt Carson, RF
7. Trevor Plouffe, 3B
8. Drew Butera, C
9. Pedro Florimon, SS

Pitching: RHP Liam Hendriks

Athletics (66-56)

1. Coco Crisp, CF
2. Stephen Drew, SS
3. Josh Reddick, RF
4. Yoenis Cespedes, LF
5. Chris Carter, 1B
6. Seth Smith, DH
7. Josh Donaldson, 3B
8. George Kottaras, C
9. Cliff Pennington, 2B

Pitching: Tommy Milone, LHP