Joe Mauer hitting weak grounders has become a disgustingly familiar sight this season.

Anybody know what Barry Bonds and Chuck Knoblauch are up to these days? Terry Ryan should probably call them -- it's hard to imagine they'd hit any worse than the completely inept players Minnesota Twins manager Ron Gardenhire is forced to trot out game after game.

With a .278 winning percentage, the Twins aren't far removed from entering the 'worst team ever' conversation. The modern day standard for ineptitude was set by the 1962 New York Mets, who went 40-120 for a nice round .250 winning percentage.

Let's hope to God that yesterday afternoon at Target Field was rock bottom for the 2012 Twins, because it's hard to imagine what getting worse would entail. During a 5-0 loss to the division-leading Cleveland Indians, the Hometown Nine were shutout by 38-year-old pitcher Derek Lowe. Was it a result of his dominating stuff? Hardly. Lowe became the first pitcher since 2002 to pull off a shutout without striking out a single opposing batter.

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Yep, this just about sums it up. A routine pop fly falls in between three Twins last night.

The 2012 Minnesota Twins are really frickin' awful.

They're so bad that somewhere out there, Butch Huskey is watching film of last night's 6-2 loss to the Toronto Blue Jays and blushing.

With an 8-23 record, the Twins' winning percentage of .258 is almost .100 points lower than second-worst San Diego. The run differential number is even more telling. Over the course of the season, the Twins have been outscored by a total of 67 runs. That differential is more than twice as bad as second-worst Kansas City, which has only been outscored by 32.

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Silver linings have been hard to find for the Twins so far in 2012.

Sure, a baseball season is a marathon, not a sprint. But the Minnesota Twins are like a distance runner experiencing bilateral leg weakness during the first mile.

You see, through 18 games, the Twins have been bad -- really, really bad, with their struggles epitomized by an 11-2 beatdown at the hands of the Boston Red Sox last night where our team couldn't hit or pitch.

In fact, you could make a strong argument that the Twins have been the worst team in the MLB thus far. Their -37 run differential is far and away the worst of out all 30 teams, 12 runs worse than the 29th-place Kansas City Royals. The Twins' 5-13 record is also second worst, again only ahead of the Royals' 3-14 mark.

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While with the Yanks, even Pavano's teammates questioned the legitimacy of some of his injuries.

Coming off a 2003 season where he posted an 18-8 record and a 3.00 ERA for the Florida Marlins, Carl Pavano opted to pitch in the City That Never Sleeps in December 2004, signing a four-year contract with the Yankees worth $39.95 million.

He spent much of the next four seasons on the disabled list with a bum shoulder, bruised ass (not kidding), auto-accident-related rib injury, and "left hip injury," among other maladies. His four-year stint was as disastrous as any since George W's first administration, and by the end of the 2008 season the New York media had taken to calling Pavano "American Idle."

Last night, Pavano, now with the Twins, pitched just his second game in New York since leaving the Yankees, and guess what? The fans there still hate him.

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Last place, here we come! (Again.)

The Twins open their 2012 campaign this afternoon in Baltimore. Coming off last year's injury-plagued last-place finish, there's less optimism about the team's chances this year than any season since Ron Gardenhire took over as manager in 2002.

Only two years removed from an AL Central-winning campaign (and subsequent playoff sweep at the hands of the Yankees), many of the faces we know and at one time loved are still here -- Joe Mauer, Justin Morneau, Francisco Liriano, Denard Span, and opening day starter Carl Pavano, to name a few. But injuries (Mauer, Morneau, and Span), declining performance (Liriano and Pavano), and the franchise's inability to develop young prospects means that few expect the Twins to return to the playoffs in 2012.

Here's a look at what a handful of national and local pundits are expecting from the Twinks this season:

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Photo by Keith Allison.

Torii Hunter chronicled the saga on Twitter.

Former Twins centerfielder Torii Hunter learned the hard way last night that his home security system works really well.

Hunter, who now plays for the Angels, started tweeting about a not-so-friendly run in with Newport police around 5:20.

According to Hunter, he accidentally set off his alarm when he was still in the house. A short time after, the cops showed up, guns drawn.

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The Twins are taking the smoking crackdown to the next level.

We all know there are fewer and fewer places where smokers can light up these days, including anywhere indoors other than a private dwelling or tobacco store.

Now, the Minnesota Twins are taking the smoking crackdown to the next level. Fox 9 reports that before Monday's home opener, the designed smoking area outside Target Field plaza will be removed.

Until now, fans could leave the ballpark, have a cig in the smoking area, then return to the game. With the smoking area abolished, those who give in to a cigarette craving during the ballgame will no longer be readmitted.

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A former high school classmate allegedly asked Pavano's family for an SUV in exchange for silence about a gay relationship.

​A former high school classmate of Twins pitcher Carl Pavano recently approached Pavano's sister with the following message: Give me a Land Rover SUV, or I'm going to go public with the fact that your brother and I had a gay relationship in high school.

Pavano's sister, Michelle DeGennaro of Southington, Connecticut, went to authorities to report Christian Bedard's extortion attempt, and police have seized a laptop and journal from Bedard's home as part of a second-degree harassment and first-degree attempt to commit larceny investigation. Bedard, 36, has not yet been charged with a crime.

On Monday, Bedard told Southington's Record-Journal he was writing a journal as a way of giving closure to what he said was an "emotional and physical relationship" between he and Pavano which lasted for three years while the two were high school classmates.

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FSN will shoot and edit the Twins forthcoming "It Gets Better" video.

​Last summer, the Twins said they were "looking into" making their own "It Gets Better" video.

According to Kevin Smith, Twins director of public affairs, that video will finally be unveiled early this season.

In an e-mail to City Pages, Smith said the video will be shot in April and will begin running in May. The anti-bullying video will feature a gay-positive message.

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Morneau's brain just hasn't been able to overcome a July 2010 concussion.

​The last year and a half has surely been an extremely frustrating time for Twins first baseman and former MVP Justin Morneau.

In July 2010, Morneau, 30, took a knee to the head while sliding into second base to break up a double play in Toronto. He was concussed, but the impact didn't look severe and most baseball observers expected Morneau to sit out just a game or two and then resume playing at 100 percent.

In the nearly 20 months since, Morneau has played in only 69 games while continuously dealing with post-concussion symptoms and looking like a shell of his former self. And this morning, he suggested more strongly than ever that the end of his career might be near.

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