BALTIMORE -- With less than week to go before Saturday's deadline for trades without waivers, the travel budget gets ignored and club credit cards develop burn marks as scouts fly and drive all over the league to evaluate players.
The Rangers had not one, not two, but three scouts at Friday's Twins-Orioles game, for instance. It was believed that they were checking out Baltimore right-hander Jeremy Guthrie and first baseman Ty Wigginton.
The Twins have their scouts out, too. They have shown interest in two of the best available starting pitchers in Houston's Roy Oswalt and Arizona's Dan Haren. But a club source indicated on Saturday that deals for those pitchers are unlikely. They reportedly had a scout at Ted Lilly's start for the Cubs on Wednesday, but there are no indications that talks have progressed.
While the Twins will continue to keep the phone lines open with other teams about potential deals (bullpen help?) their best chance to improve the starting rotation is to get improved performances from some of the struggling arms.
Scott Baker stepped up in that way on Saturday as he worked seven innings in the Twins' 7-2 win over Baltimore.
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Baker, 8-9, won for just the second time in his last six starts. And he was winless on the road in seven starts going back to the second week of the season before beating Baltimore. And he feels he can forget about the tendinitis in his elbow that forced him to be moved to the back of the starting rotation coming out of the All-Star break.
Baker held the Orioles to two runs on four hits over seven innings with a walk and eight strikeouts.
"I'm pretty pleased with the way it has recovered," Baker said. "It seems to get better every outing, I don't foresee it being a problem anymore."
Offensively, the Twins were 5-for-14 with runners in scoring position and drove in four of their seven runs with two outs. Delmon Young had the fifth four-hit game of his career while hitting a two-run homer in the fifth after a sacrifice fly in the first. He's batting .420 with four homers and 23 RBI in his last 21 games.
"We know we have a good offense," Baker said.
That's why it's imperative for the Twins to figure out their rotation and return to first place in the AL Central -- they moved in front of Detroit and into second place in the division, two games behind the White Sox.
Carl Pavano continued his roll by pitching the Twins to victory in Thursday's series opener. Brian Duensing, making his first start of the season as a replacement for the struggling Nick Blackburn, pitched five solid innings on Friday in a game the bullpen gave away. After Baker's outing on Saturday, it's now right-hander Kevin Slowey's turn today to show he can get back on track.
Twins GM Bill Smith and assistant GM Rob Antony are exploring upgrades but it will probably be up to the Twins who are already here to fuel a playoff run.
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"This is what we left out of spring training with and we said this is a good baseball team and we can win our division with these guys if all goes right," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "That doesn't change but we have to get them right. We can't control what's happens upstairs. Billy and Robby are working their tails off and if we find the right pieces that makes us better that's fine.
"My job and my coaching staffs' job is to get the guys playing better."
