Manager Rocco Baldelli talks Twins hitting problem and the need to 'freakin' fix it fast'

ATLANTA – On getaway days, there is always a time listed somewhere around the Twins' clubhouse for when the bus will depart for the airport.

No time was written Wednesday after the Twins were swept by the Braves, totaling three runs in the three-game series. Players sat behind closed doors to conduct a players-only team meeting as manager Rocco Baldelli declared none of them would be made available to speak to reporters.

"This plane will leave whenever this plane leaves," Baldelli said. "I don't know what they're talking about exactly in there, but I hope it's a lot of what I'm saying right now."

Baldelli criticized the team's offense, which has sputtered for months. How bad has it been? The Twins had a .723 OPS in April, a .718 OPS in May and a .674 OPS in June. They've scored the second-fewest runs per game in the majors this month, ahead of only the Royals. Their strikeout rate has increased every month and they remain on pace to shatter MLB's all-time record in strikeouts.

The Twins struck out 14 times Wednesday, whiffing on 29 of their 72 swings (40%) in a game in which the starting pitcher entered with a career 6.07 ERA. Baldelli said the team looked "flat" and lamented the inability to make any offensive adjustments.

"It's a huge bucket of at-bats that I'm talking about," Baldelli said. "They are just so far from where we need to be that we need to own it. I'm not doing my job and the players aren't doing their jobs if we don't actually sit here and acknowledge this. They know it. They're smart players. They understand what is going on. Fixing it is never easy, but we better freakin' fix it fast."

Following a Guardians victory Wednesday, the Twins fell out of first place in a dreadful division for the first time since April 10. They start a three-game series in Baltimore on Friday night.

When Baldelli was asked what changes were coming, he didn't offer specific details. He said the coaches needed to sit down and "answer some pretty hard questions." There have been internal talks about the offense throughout the season — there was a team meeting in Tampa Bay this month about their two-strike approach — but Baldelli wanted to air his frustration publicly and his players to talk among themselves privately.

"This is a challenge," Baldelli said. "This is an ultimatum for our team."

The Twins are one of the league's worst-hitting teams against lefthanded pitching (.216 batting average, .660 OPS), a big reason why Atlanta chose lefthander Kolby Allard to make a spot start in Wednesday's series finale. They've been streaky with runners on base — 0-for-23 with runners in scoring position in Atlanta — because they strike out so often.

"We're scrapping just to score a run right now," Baldelli said. "You can't win every game clawing for a run, two runs. It feels like we've been like that for a long time."

After the Twins were swept by the Rays, hitting coach David Popkins noted metrics that showed them as baseball's best-hitting team when they were ahead in counts based on exit velocity, walks and barrels. Popkins, using a golf term, said an issue was they turned to their driver too often, leading to strikeouts.

Third baseman Royce Lewis, earlier on the road trip, said he cut his own strikeout rate because he was no longer "waiting for a pitch you can drive." Instead, he focused on becoming more aggressive.

"I looked at where some of our plans were going and how the pitchers were pitching us and they weren't attacking us with our plan of getting a mistake," Lewis said.

As much as the Twins believe they have too much talent to struggle offensively all year, the first half of the season is over. They've pitched as well as they hoped entering the season and they don't even have a .500 record to show for it.

"Nothing changes unless there is some urgency," Baldelli said. "The first half is by us. We played middling type of baseball through the first half."

Baldelli called Atlanta "one of the best teams we've seen in a long time," and thought the three-game series served as a measuring stick. The Twins fell well short and flopped out of first place.

"This is my job to make sure we get our acts together, look in the mirror, answer the hard questions and ultimately win out there," the fifth-year manager said. "That's what we have to do and I'll take that on."