Cliff Lee Twins Legend: An Alternate Trade Deadline History

For the first time in 5 years the Twins are buyers at the deadline, and with the Mariners in town and the Twitter fanbase on fire, I thought it would be fun to to look back at the last big Twins trade that never happened and imagine what it would be like if the Twins had acquired Cliff Lee from the Mariners 5 years ago.

Note: this is a work of fiction, not a genuine attempt at analyzing impacts...I'm not that smart, I'm just a weird guy who likes Alternate History 

7/9/2010

When the Rangers refuse to part with Justin Smoak, the Twins acquire Cliff Lee for Wilson Ramos, Aaron Hicks, Kyle Gibson and Anthony Slama. Minnesota fans rejoice so much that no one notices that Justin Morneau remains sidelined after a collision in Toronto

7/31/2010

Without any more trade chips, the Twins go without a proven closer, despite tempting overtures about emerging Nats closer Matt Capps, trusting John Rauch to save the day, or failing that...Cliff Lee on his off days

9/21/2010

The Twins clinch the AL Central with 12 games to spare, allowing manager Ron Gardenhire to set up his rotation for a matchup with either the Yankees or Rays in the first round. "Cliffy has done real good up here...so he might just be our game 1 starter" says Gardy. "Doi!!!" say Twins fans.

10/12/2010

The Twins finally break their Yankee he'd after Cliff Lee wins Game 5 at Target Field with a 1 run shutout. Says Lee, "it was a bit rough (with the bullpen nearly blowing Liriano's game 2 lead) but we got there in the end, good thing Glen (Perkins) came in in the 8th, you know...he could make a good set up man."

10/20/2010

Backed by the home run power of  Jim Thome, Delmon Young and Danny Valencia, the Twins need only 5 games to beat the Rangers in Arlington and advance to the World Series against the Giants. Asked if he's worried about Cliff Lee's workload, manager Rob Gardenhire replies, "work what now?"

11/1/2010

Twins lose the World Series to the Giants in 5 games, but remain upbeat. "Obviously we would rather have the trophy, but we'll back and loaded next year, that's for sure" pledges Lee.

Still stings, doesn't it Twins fans?

12/14/10
Cliff Lee jilts Minnesota to re-sign with the Philadelphia Phillies. "I never wanted to leave in the first place," says Lee, "obviously it was nice to help Minnesota, but Philadelphia is where my heart lies." Undeterred, General Manager Bill Smith seeks to lock down the squad that brought Minnesota their first AL Pennant in nearly 20 years giving extensions to JJ Hardy (through 2014), Delmon Young (through 2015), and Francisco Liriano (through 2014) and re-signs Jim Thome. 

2/15/11

Spring training for the AL champs starts with high hopes as Justin Morneau and Joe Nathan return as do new Twins Carl Pavano (who had a fine second half with the Texas Rangers) and intriguing Japanese infielder Tsuyoshi Nishioka who Bill Smith hopes could push Alexi Casilla at second base ("he might even be able to spell JJ at short stop" gushes Smith who is eager to offset the loss of fan favorite Nick Punto )

4/7/11

Shame we lost Hardy on this take out slide

Disaster strikes as Nick Swisher slides into second base breaking JJ Hardy's fibula. Manager Ron Gardenhire quickly installs Tsuyoshi Nishioka as the new starting shortstop. A quick RBI triple and lunging grab to his left causes the fan base to erupt with joy as the Twins take a series in Yankee stadium. One fan goes so far as to get a "Nishioka Forever" tattoo.

8/15/11
The Twins have the highlight of their year when Jim Thome hits his 500th Home Run. It's Thome's last before he returns to Cleveland for one final playoff run with his first team. Meanwhile the double play combination of Hardy and Nishioka (or Thunder and Lightning as fans have taken to calling them) offer a ray of hope to compensate for the regression of Danny Valencia and Delmon Young (despite peripheral stats that suggest Nishioka isn't quite as good as his rookie year attests). The team finishes with a 69-93 record, which will give them the fourth pick in the 2012 draft, their highest in a decade.

12/14/11
With a lot of money tied up in other extensions the Twins face a difficult decision between keeping beloved reliever Joe Nathan, former top prospect Jason Kubel, or right fielder Michael Cuddyer who had paced the offense while Morneau and Mauer worked to make a come back. Citing the need for a "proven closer" the Twins resign Nathan (for 3 years), and Kubel (for 2 years). "This year was an anomaly," says Smith who was given a full vote of confidence by ownership, "I don't expect us to have a year like that again, and I'm sure the players don't either."

It wasn't his finest hour, 

4/16/12

Hours after a drunken Delmon Young's anti-semitic tirade in New York and subsequent suspension ("We won't tolerate that" says Jim Pohlad), call-up Ben Revere stuns the crowd with a great leaping catch in left field. Fans who hope a return to the Bronx will remind a struggling Nishioka of his strong April are disappointed when he airmails two throws into the Yankees dugout. Rochester infielder Brian Dozier packs his bags.


8/5/12

With the #4 Pick in the MLB Draft the Twins select
Mike Zunino thereby solving all catching problems
ever...

The Twins end their connection with ALCS hero Danny Valencia by trading him through waivers to the Red Sox. "It's part of the game," explained Manager Ron Gardenhire, "Danny gave us a lot over two years ago, I'm sure he'll give his best in Boston." Some fans, frustrated with the inconsistency of Francisco Liriano, had hoped that the former ace in the making and the big third baseman could bring in significant pitching prospects are left wanting. But many have now turned their attention to the Twins top draft choice: Florida Catcher Mike Zunino ("hey, look at what happened the last time they took a catcher in the top 5...maybe this one won't even get bilateral leg weakness!")


10/1/2012
The Twins finish their season of struggle sliding to 67-95

11/29/2012
Citing their "complete confidence" in Ben Revere the Twins trade Denard Span to the Nationals for Vance Worley and Trevor May. Revere's diving catches and ear-to-ear smile become the face of the Twins.

12/6/2012
The Twins shockingly trade their second outfielder in a week, when the Tigers offer the Twins a random relief prospect to take Delmon Young off our hands, who they think is just the veteran bat they need to finally win the World Series. "THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU" shout Twins fans. A small group of fans chant the same words at Tsyuoshi Nishioka's Air Japan flight back home at the completion of his contract.

2/1/2013
GM Bill Smith gushes about the team's newly revamped pitching staff: "We know that Perkins, Burton and Nathan can do what we need at the end of the game, but we needed pitchers who could get the leads there. I think we have a very deep rotation, Scott [Diamond] took a big step forward, we know what Francisco [Liriano] is capable of, and now with veteran arms like Kevin Correia and Mike Pelfry we have what we need to compete."

Still hurts to see a Twins legend
in rival colors.

7/31/2013

For the first time in over a decade the Twins are never close to contention, due in large part to complete implosions in the starting rotation. The team decides to sell off many of their veteran assets at the trade deadline: Morneau and Liriano head to the Pirates, JJ Hardy goes to the Diamondbacks, Jason Kubel goes to the Cleveland Indians on a short rental. "I guess we're really rebuilding," writes one Twins Daily blogger, "good thing Mauer's locked in at Catcher."



8/19/13 
Joe Mauer sustains a concussion during a make up game against the New York Mets that spells the end of his catching career, and top prospect Mike Zunino struggles a bit when called up to split time with Drew Butera as his replacement. The only shocking silver linings in another disappointing season (66 - 96) are the sudden burst of power from second baseman Brian Dozier, says team closer Joe Nathan, "he's the real deal."

11/11/13

Bill Smith steps down as General Manager admitting, "yeah...I can't believe I lasted this long either," the Twins take the unusual step of inviting back former GM Terry Ryan to replace him. "It's time to turn the page and build from within," says Ryan before looking at a farm system that boasts Miguel Sano, Mike Zunino, Second Baseman Eddie Rosario, and not much else. "Well, crap..." says Ryan afterwards.

12/6/13
The Twins welcome new starting pitchers, Ricky Nolasco and Phil Hughes at a press conference. On the emerging slew of podcasts, one Twins follower says: "Obviously we'd like to have our own pitchers come up through the minors, but besides [Trevor] May at Double A, our best options are the kid we got for not resigning Cuddyer [Berrios], and Kohl Stewart. So they're all a ways away."


3/22/14
With uncertainty around the aging familiar stars and the unknown new signings, The Twins turn to young talent to highlight their ad campaign, "Bringing Smiles back to Twins Territory". The ads mostly consist of Ben Revere and Brian Dozier smiling brightly at the camera saying, "please come back...please...? You're a very attractive person...I'd like to see you at the ballpark...Please?"

7/15/14
While some stat heads argue that Twins Closer Joe Nathan had been outperformed by set up man Glen Perkins, Nathan is the one player chosen to represent the Twins at their home town all star game. Though he loads the bases, he does deliver a final strike out to lone Rangers representative Kurt Suzuki. "God, he'd be better than Butera and Zunino" carps one Twins fan.

9/25/14
The Twins near the end of their 4th straight 90 loss season despite an all-time record Strike out to walk ratio for new starter Phil Hughes. In their final home game the team stages a moving tribute to Joe Nathan, who, after giving up the closer spot in September to Glen Perkins, gets one last 9th inning against the Arizona Diamondbacks. After the game Nathan says "wait...why didn't I get the Mariano Rivera farewell tour?...screw it! I'm coming back next year!"

12/3/14
Torii Hunter joins the Twins for one final season despite the offer to complete a new soul patrol in Seattle with Aaron Hicks and top prospect Byron Buxton. 

4/3/15
New signee Ervin Santana is suspended for 80 games for testing positive for a performance enhancing drug. Rookie Trevor May is added to the rotation behind Mike Pelfry. "Would have been nice to see a little competition for that spot," says Terry Ryan, "but we like the guys we have."

The Newest Twin...

7/31/15
At the trade deadline the surprisingly contending Twins seem in desperate need of a shortstop (as no one has compared to Hardy and Nishioka), catcher (to replace Butera as the struggling Zunino goes back to AAA) and in the bullpen. Terry Ryan delivers only Tampa Bay Reliever Kevin Jepsen to complement Glen Perkins setting up for Joe Nathan, at the cost of starter prospect Chih Wei Hui. Fans demand a more meaningful move, like the one that got them Cliff Lee 5 years ago.

The Great Twins Scotch Bet: Pt. 4 Down the Stretch They Come

"We're helping Scruffy win
a scotch!!"

It shouldn't be too much a surprise what's going on...after all, I can't seem to find time to write anything but this form piece. But in case you're allergic to scrolling down, here's this week's update in the Heavenly Peanuts Scotch Bet (2014 Edition)


Coming down to the last week of the season the Twins stand at 66 and 89, on pace for 69 wins, which is to say dangerously close for the purposes of our bet.

First, it's time to admit again that my father-in-law (known affectionately here as "The Gouger" to protect his true identity from shareholders) has been eliminated yet again. His prediction of 75 or more wins was still too optimistic for the Minnesota Twins to deliver on. However there are two of us left and here's how it shakes out.

Mmm...peat...

If the Twins win 3 games or less, Stinky [my beloved, Peat-addicted wife] wins
If the Twins win 4 games or more, I win [and will likely settle for an excellent, though possibly mellower and more Sherry-tastic scotch]

While running a 14 K Saturday, Stinky expressed her feeling that perhaps this year would be my year. Then of course the Twins dropped back to back games to the Indians and left us very much unsettled about the week ahead.

The final three home games of the season will pit the Twins against the Arizona Diamondbacks, one of exactly three teams with a worse record than the Twins. (They've played the other two (Texas and Colorado) as well and have a cumulative record of 4-6...yes...we even lose to the losers.) Then they go on the road for four against the Detroit Tigers, who have surprisingly struggled against the Twins this season. (In fact, the Twins only have winning records against five teams: the Padres, White Sox, Blue Jays and Mariners.)

Remember when you wore this
ugly D-Back-ish jersey and were
awesome Kyle? We do...

So, what will it take for me to get my wife to buy me a drink? A 4-3 stretch, which--coincidentally--is exactly the stretch the Twins just completed this last week. They'll send their best pitchers up against the Diamondbacks (assuming a slightly less than terrible Ricky Nolasco now counts as one of our best)...and it will be particularly important for Kyle Gibson to bounce back with a good final start. Trevor May and some sacrificial lamb (in lieu of Tommy Milone) will likely get pounded by the Tigers in the first two games in Detroit, and if that allows the Tigers to rest players up for the playoffs Nolasco and Gibson might just save my proverbial bacon.

God Speed and Good Whisky to you Twins Pitchers...we're all going to need it.

What the Twins' World Needs Right Now

The trade deadline is looming over the heads of Twins fans right now. Like a honed knife's edge, like a hunter's net, like a disapproving parent at the doorway of a kegger thrown by their independent child: it's looming.

At least that's my feeling. And I admit it's a weird one. After all the Twins are sellers (again) in a seller's market (witness the hauls for relatively unimpressive talents thus far). We should be confident. We should be beaming with pride. We should be the belle of the ball, fending off suitors for our valuable assets. Sure they aren't that valuable, but who cares? It's the trade deadline, value is inflated and we've got what other teams want.

So why does the deadline worry me so much?

Twins War Room (artist depiction)

Because I feel like we need to get something great out of it, far more than any contending team does.

Because I feel like we need a win. And if they aren't coming from the field, then they need to come from the smoke-filled rooms where deals are made. (Though I suppose, since smoking bans went into effect the rooms are probably just filled with smug self-importance.)

It's not that surprising or worrying that the Twins are sellers. It's not surprising that the season is in tatters and we're all debating what they can steal from some desperate rival's hands. What is surprising is that I'm nervous about it, and I'm all too resigned to seeing the deadline pass with another unimpressive whimper.

After three years of supporting management's decisions, I'm dumbstruck. I've supported patience and measured responses. I've supported building from within. I've supported the cautious investments in low-end free agents. But now I've got nothing, and I'm desperate.

I can't figure out why woefully struggling players trot out to the field long past their sell-by date. I've got no idea why our young players are accepted as consistently inconsistent. And I'm at an utter loss to understand why prospects are left to languish in the minor leagues when there's no better rival for the position in the bigs.

My cat has already given up

In short. I'm a Twins fan. And I am desperate.

We need a win here. We didn't just lose 7 games on the home stand. We lost a year of development for Sano. We lost half-a-year for Buxton. We lost a couple months of Meyer and May learning the big league routine. We lost a chunk of cash on Pelfry and Nolasco. We lost the feel good memories of Bartlett, Kubel and Matty G. We lost the hope of a consistent Arcia, a burgeoning Pinto, a resiliant Hicks. We are in a constant state of losing Joe Mauer: day by day, sore inch by sore inch, percentage point by percentage point, insult by insult...until, I'm convinced, some day he wakes up and either can't play or can't wait to play anywhere but here.

We might be the unluckiest team in baseball, but right now we are definitely losers. And we're starting to feel like we're always going to be losers (hence the widely reported swing towards apathy this last week). This feels like a chance, a golden chance to get a win. But that's the problem with feeling like losers: even when you have a golden chance to win...you start expecting that you WILL LOSE.

That's why the trade deadline's looming. This is our chance to turn Josh Willingham and Kevin Correia and Kurt Suzuki into Gold* (See note below). But there's that nagging fear that they'll turn into a flaming bag of poo instead. After all, when you're as desperate as I feel right now, you don't make the best choices.

We need a win right now. I want us to win right now. And I have very little confidence that we will.

But hey...If I wanted to feel confidence on a regular basis I wouldn't be a Twins fan. If I was on the point of collapsing into apathy or anger I wouldn't keep using the "we" pronoun when talking about a team that has never employed me or asked my opinion about anything.

*Honestly, I know they aren't worth gold and no GM would give us gold, but if we could get a couple pieces of bronze, and an opportunity to see a piece of silver from the vault, I'd call that a win.

The Plouffe Paradox

Last Friday, I attended what will likely be my last game of the year. As you would expect, I ate more than was good for me, and watched the Twins go down in ignominious defeat.

I also heard a noise I had never heard before at the ballpark.

There were men at first and second with one out when a ground ball rolled harmlessly to Trevor Plouffe. One out, easy as pie...but did he throw the ball to second base for the double play? No. No he did not.

I've heard fans boo; I've heard fans jeer; I've heard fans scream and cry and gnash their teeth in frustration, but until that play I had never heard fans make this noise in unison:

BAD PLOUFFE!!

"YAA--waahhhh--ohhhhh....uuuggghh..."

It took me a while before I realized what that was. It was the sound of resigned disappointment. It was the sound of hundreds of Twins fans having a reaction that was not only instantaneous, it was bred from months and now years of watching Trevor Plouffe play baseball.

YAA--it starts with excitement, potential, possibility, familiar thrills.

Waaahhhhh--then comes disbelief, sharp, incredulous, dumbfounded.

Ohhhhh--then there's recognition, a sense that this has all happened before, particularly when there's that number 24 on the jersey.

Uuuggghh--finally there's dismay, dissatisfaction, and acceptance that this is our lot in life. As if to say: "Of, course you did that, Trevor, of course you did."

Best of all, the sound can be reversed for a pleasant appreciation of underrated talent (only this time, when Trevor Plouffe is at the plate). A single, a double, the rare high arching home run. They're all moments of pure Plouffey pleasure starting with rumbling fear (uuuggghh), recognition (ohhhh), disbelief (waaahhhhhh) and excitement (YAA!)

That's what Trevor Plouffe adds to the Twins: a familiar face and even more familiar reaction. Whatever else we think of the Twins, whatever we think they ought to do in the offseason, who they ought to fire, hire or blow up in a quest to reverse the bad juju, we can all agree on Trevor Plouffe.

Maybe Plouffe's doing it intentionally. Maybe, like Haley Mills (or more accurately, like Lindsey Lohan), he's offering us a Parent Trap like chance to rekindle our love for each other.

Good Plouffe!

If we're torn between whether to rebuild the pitching staff internally or cast our lot amongst the free agents--Trevor Plouffe reminds us that we can all agree on his crappy fielding.

If we're arguing fiercely over whether Joe Mauer ought to move to first base or keep his catching gear--Trevor Plouffe reminds us that he too can hit from time to time.

If we're arguing over whether Trevor Plouffe totally stinks or only mostly stinks...well...you get the idea.

In a season of lost causes and hopeless false starts, it's important to appreciate the little things: Trevor Plouffe uniting us all in agreement is one of them. Bravo Trevor, Bravo.

The Great Twins Scotch Bet

Kevin Corriea: Determined to Win My Wife a Scotch

At the start of the year my wife (aka Stinky), her father (aka Gouger) and I made a bet. The winner of this bet would win two glasses of scotch (redeemable at any time they chose), the losers would buy said scotch.

The subject of the bet, naturally for a set of Twins fans, was how many games the Twin would win this year, so as we near the end of the season, it seems only right to check our progress and odds of winning the bet. (What else is there to root for this year?)

The Wagers

Stinky: 0-69 Wins

Scruffy: 70-74 Wins

Gouger: 75-81 Wins

Where We Are Now

The Twins stand at 61-80 for a winning percentage of .433. Based on that winning percentage the Twins stand to win 70 games (or 71 if you prefer the science behind predictionmachine.com). The team has 21 games left. which means we're each rooting for the following outcomes.

Stinky: 8-13 or worse wins or less

Scruffy: 9-12 to 13-8

Gouger: 14-7 or better

Gut Feeling

For the time being the math is in my favor. But I'm increasingly hard pressed to see how the Twins can win even 9 games, especially as they face a string of playoff teams. Fielding a team of Rochester's best against the A's and the Rays this week seems like the recipe for an underwhelming week. Maybe they could pull something off against the Angels (if Pedro Hernandez gets his act together) and maybe they can sneak one from the A's...but more than two seems unlikely.

Why the City Pages are Silly

It's a spring-time tradition. When Spring Break arrives, I say goodbye to my students, make a few Arrested Development jokes with my colleagues, and pick up as much as I can find on the impending baseball season

This year, in addition to the standard season preview issues of Sports Illustrated and ESPN, I also picked up the City Pages, on the basis of it's ominous headline "Baseball's Fiscal Cliff: As another season begins, MLB faces an unsustainable future--and you're picking up the tab". (Certainly a title capable of grabbing attention, and the whole article is available here)

Credit: City Pages

The fiscal cliff referred to by author--Pete Kotz--is based on 4 clear points (with the emphasis and dire headline being based most clearly on the 4th point)

1. Baseball is beset with competitive imbalance
To Kotz's mind the more popular NFL and NBA help their sports thrive by helping teams thrive in middle-markets like Green Bay and San Antonio, while grand ol' game is trapped in a recurring cycle where "the big crush the small with painful regularity".


2. Baseball is losing its fan base (particularly among young men)
You can see the diminishing fan base in the graph at the right. The audience for a typical World Series game has shrunk by 29.6 million eyes from 1980 to today. Including the surprising stat that "More women age 50 and older watched the world series did men under 49".



The largest financial gain for baseball is its lucrative tv contracts which will soon come under threat from increased demand for better product


It's no surprise that Sports are lucrative for broadcast networks to air (no one lines up to watch March Madness stunners on hulu the day after). So there are multiple millions if not billions in the offing when teams agree to broadcasting contracts. However the companies that own your local teams' broadcaster (Time Warner/Disney/Viacom/News Corps) are able to recoup the oodles they pay for baseball by making satellite and cable companies sell lower rated channels like Disney XD along with ESPN or FUEL Tv alongside Fox Sports North. Of course the satellite and cable companies pass that cost on to consumers.

But with the rise of on-line watching, Kotz argues, all viewers are increasingly likely to switch off the tv unless things change, and bills (which may soon top $200/month) drop. (Perhaps through an anti-trust suit from Viacom which seeks to eliminate the channel-bundling and sell channels to consumers individually.)



If the cable contracts change, the tv contract bubble will burst, competitive imbalance will become entrenched and the few remaining fans will have to pay exorbitant prices in order to ever see a winner again.


This is the core of Kotz's case. If you can buy individual channels, those who want family fare (like Disney Channel) but not sports will spurn the extra cost on their cable bill and, as he sees it: "[b]aseball's welfare payments from non-fans will corrode. And with an audience in decline, remaining subscribers will be forced to spend that much more to compensate." Thereby leaving poor teams like the Twins charging fans more both at the turnstiles and on the cable bill to make money, hire players and win games.

This is an argument. But as I see it, it has a couple of clear flaws too.

1. Baseball is rife with parity
This would be Jayson Stark's turf, so I won't really get into this too much, I'll just to trot out perhaps the best stat of all:  12/32 NFL teams have won a Super Bowl in the last 25 years, by contrast 16/30 MLB teams have won a World Series over the same time span...yup, you've got no chance if you aren't the Yankees



Baseball's fan base cannot be judged by World Series ratings



True, but irrelevant. Credit: CityPages
To be sure, baseball's World Series' ratings are embarrassing. But they are less embarrassing when you consider how baseball does in other venues.
News reports point out that daily viewership of local teams is fairly constant within most media markets. Take the Tigers: they get about 168,000 people tuning in to tv each day, plus 199,700 people tuning into the radio, that'll be 367,7000 people tuning in each week...just within Detroit. (The Lions draw from a national audience to try to match that in one day).
On top of that, you should consider the fact that baseball's long season enables a near constant conversation about the games on social media and the internet. "Detroit Tigers Blogs" kick out 40 million hits on google, "Detroit Lions Blogs" kick out about 24 million hits. (Heck the Twins even crush the Vikings (about 22 million to 19 million...AND THE TWINS STUNK WHILE THE VIKINGS MADE THE PLAYOFFS)
The truth is that, while national ratings are down, local interest is up. Would it be nice to see the World Series return to its bygone glory? Yes it would. But do woeful World Series ratings mean baseball is doomed? Absolutely not.



Lucrative tv contracts are undoubtedly valuable, but are not the only factor in making a team competitive


Naturally local markets can pay more if they have more subscribers (Angels and Yankees broadcasting contracts are going to pour more money into the teams they're paying than local broadcasters in say, Oakland and Tampa Bay).
Nevertheless, as the last decade worth of parity (see point 1) has made clear, you don't have to be swimming in tv contract cash in order to make your team competitive (witness the success of the A's and the Angels, or the Rays and Yankees). Teams have found ways to succeed without money before, and they'll seek ways to succeed without them now.




Who says that this is what will happen if the cable contracts change?


Here's the biggest problem I have with Kotz's article and the City Pages' fear mongering. They've given into what I tell my students is an "if...then fallacy". If one thing happens, then another will inevitably follow. You see it in presidential campaign ads (like...this one).


Credit: City Pages
But there's a problem with assuming that one action will invariably lead to atom bombs or war with moon nazis: there's no way to know whether or not this will really happen. Let's say Kotz is right and cable companies start offering the chance to buy channels individually rather than as a set. Why does that mean that customers will abandon sports channels rather than turning to them in greater numbers? (Personal example: the only non-network channels I watch are FSN, ESPN and Comedy Central anyway...so I'm in regardless; my younger brother can't afford cable, but if he could get the sports channels he wanted without paying hundreds of bucks for sports AND SoapNet/E!, he'd do it in a heart beat).
Or, if you prefer, if cable contracts change AND sports channels are abandoned, why does that mean that teams will be forced to charge regular fans more? Why won't it lead to a greater degree of fiscal restraint? The fall out from A-Rod's mammoth contract (and subsequent crapitude) has already largely flattened player's prices. Moreover, with 15 years of solid labor agreements behind them, the union has a good sense of what they can/should expect from management. If they know finances are getting crunched, they'll have to accept that and the lower salaries that come along with it.
However you slice it, there's just no guarantee that the so-called "Fiscal Cliff" is  nearly as dire as Kotz and the City Pages make it seem.

There are problems with baseball. It's naive to argue otherwise. But should we really be bracing ourselves for a financial disaster that will doom us to decades of overpaying for the foreseeable future? Probably not.

I can see why the City Pages published the article ('tis the season, after all), but there's just no need to make a 125 year old institution that has weathered recessions, depressions and wars that minimized their workforce seem like it's going to be doomed because of a cable company's law suit? That's just silly.

Lessons from a mom

Yesterday for mother's day I helped honor the woman who taught me how to irrationally love a bunch of wild, punk kids...she had practice with my brothers and I, and it's clearly served her well as a baseball fan too.

My mother is a die-hard, eternally loyal and unflaggingly optimistic, and permanently enamored of the Twins. She cheers for Mauer when others boo, she cheers for Nishioka when others leave him for dead, somehow-someway, she even cheers for Matt Capps. But over mother's day brunch yesterday, after I told the whole table "we're rebuilding this year," she looked me dead in the eye and said, "Thank God!"

We can't believe it either Ron
(Credit Pioneer Press)

It wasn't supposed to be like this. Truth be told, I still find it hard to fathom that it IS like this. I mean...for a decade the Twins average record was 89 and 73, their average runs scored was 775 while giving up only 720 (that +55 is well above the league average). We had two sluggers still ascending into the prime of their careers who hadn't had a WAR under 3 since they were punk kids. Did last year stink? Sure! But it seemed like a one-off aberration, a trick of the light or the ghosts of pine trees or something. 

That the Twins are the worst team in baseball right now is staggering. Last in runs scored. Last in home runs AND home runs allowed (we don't hit them and our opponents do). Last in total bases. Last in ERA. Last in strikeouts per 9 innings. Last, Last, Last. 

It is, as the cliche puts it, a very short trip from the penthouse to the outhouse, but the Twins didn't so much take an express elevator as they took a Wil-E-Coyote Style Face plant to the bottom of the standings.

Could we spend time analyzing how and why it all went so wrong? Second guessing signing Jason Marquis, triple guessing the Nishioka deal, dectuple guessing Bill Smith's Santana trade? Yeah, but why bother? It happened. It can't un-happen. Move on.

I'd say Joe looks sad but I don't
Have much to compare it to.
(Credit: Sam's Spam)

Could we spend time fixating on the failures of certain players we've come to expect more from: the sudden aging of Carl Pavano, the power outage of Joe Mauer, the utter debacle that is Senor Francisco Liriano? Yeah, but again, why bother? I'm not as intelligent in analyzing such matters as others (see Nelson, Nick; Bonnes, John; Strohs, Seth; Hageman, Parker; Walter, Peter; Christie, Cody, etc.) so I doubt that the players, coaches or fellow fans would gain much from reading my thought that "boy, Danny Valencia sure does stink, eh?"

So, if I'm not going to analyze and critique management, and if I'm not going to whinge and bellyache about players, what else is left to do for a losing ballclub? Clearly, now would be the time to turn tail and run. To shut down the blog, to cut the cable cost, and to hide away until the Twins are once again competitive and then reemerge claiming that "I knew it all along!"

That might be the intelligent thing to do...but, and here's a shocker...I'M NOT VERY SMART. So I'll keep writing, keep finding little things in the game to make myself laugh, keep looking for  players to root for and reasons to get excited. I'll plug away little by little, because that's what the Twins themselves are doing. I'll keep hoping and wishing and appreciating the little things, saving up for the cheapest season tickets available, and loving every minute of fresh air, sunshine and baseball.

My mother raised me right. Play nice. Work hard. Make dumb jokes if it makes you happy. And above all else: love everybody (even when it's tough). She loved me when I was an insufferable teenager, and no matter how bad the Twins are they aren't pubescent teens.

So, as mind-boggling as this boondoggle of a season is. I'll keep going, just like my mom will. Just like the Twins will.

Grade Check!

Yes, we peanuts are still alive and kicking, but it has not been easy keeping up with our beloved Twins. You see, Stinky has this thing called "work" which makes her do many, many important things, but very few of them are baseball related. Where as I, Scruffy, have this thing called "teaching" which will eventually lead to a wonderful summer full of partial planning and lots of baseball watching, but which (right now) requires me to be working from 7 AM most mornings till 9 PM most nights, plus plenty of hours on the weekend to boot (also--I decided that coaching Track was a good idea...not sure why, but I did).

So, as we try to get back into the blogging swing of things we're proud to present a little grade check (thereby blending both baseball and my job...clearly, I need a social life). Yes, hard as it is to believe the season is almost 1/6th of the way gone. So without further ado, here's the check in

Honor Roll

Most Likely to Succeed (Credit: CBS)

A+ Josh Willingham--"The Hammer" is like that kid who moves into your school district over the summer and suddenly is the coolest, most happening guy ever. Girls want to date him, guys want to be like him, dogs want to sniff his crotch...basically James Bond with a bat. (Random stats: if the Twins were just 9 Josh Willingham clones their winning percentage would be .879 and the likelihood that the clones would overrun the city and take over the world would be .798!)

A Joe Mauer, Denard Span--Here's a shock, Joe Mauer is quietly (almost boringly--shocker) hitting well, fielding well and offering stock answers to questions (Quoth the Chairman: "I feel pretty good but um...we gotta get more runs across and ahhh...you know...get back to ahh...winning ball games"). Meanwhile Denard Span has been equally stellar anchoring a tumultuous outfield and offering a great season at the top of the lineup (Random stats: say what you will about cavernous Target Field, Denard Span has managed to hit above the league average for Batting Average, On Base Percentage AND slugging percentage--thank you gaps!; meanwhile Joe Mauer continues to lead the league in soft, manageable hair--thank you Head and Shoulders!)

B Justin Morneau-- "Shows great signs of improvement" that's the key phrase on Dr. Neau's report card. Where once there was only doubt and concern, now there is doubt and concerned mixed with verifiable accounts of lingering awesomeness. PLUS, the sight of him by first base makes Stinky all twitterpated again. (Random stats: 53% of all Morneau's hits are extra base hits; Unfortunately he is one of several millions of Canadians diagnosed with "Canuckitis" aka--how are there teams from Phoenix, LA and Nashville still playing hockey while we've got bupkus?)

Under the Radar with Potential

B- The Bullpen--Sure Carl Pavano's pitching well, but this recognition needs to go to a group of pitchers we were frankly worried about who have, surprisingly, not totally sucked! Yes, of the Twins 16 losses only 4 fall on the heads of the Bullpen, we've seen fine performances from stalwart Glen Perkins, ex-rotation-also-rans Brian Duensing, Anthony Swarzak and Alex Burnett and newcomer/"who-the-hell-is-that?" candidates Jeff Gray, Jared Burton and Matt Maloney. So shine on Twins bullpen, you might be beneficial in a year or two! (Random Stats: Perkins, Duensing and Burton have helped batters get themselves out with swinging strike percentages of 19% or higher--6% of the league average; also the bullpen has managed to knit four Afghans, three camisoles and one lamb-theme onesie while waiting for their chance to come in with a lead)

This child's adorableness made possible by bullpen free-time
(Stealing a pattern from the Knitting Queen)

C+ Jamey Carroll--Besides inspiring perhaps my favorite new nickname "Country Strong" Jamey Carroll, our new Shortstop has been a solid contributor in the field and in the batters box. He won't earn many highlight reel mentions or gushing fan praise, but he does his job, he does it well, and he has earned our respect (Random stats: He doesn't have many hits, but 60% of the hits he does have have been stretched for an extra base; he has successfully avoided 99 consecutive calls from Garth Brooks' alter ego "Chris Gaines")

Under the Radar with Some Concerns

C- Right Fielder "TBA"--This little slot in the line up seems to give our team fits. Over 23 games, the Twins have rotated through 5 players (Plouffe, Thomas, Doumit, Revere and Parmlee) and while a positional carousel isn't necessarily a bad thing, it does have the potential to drive one crazy: what with the ups and downs, the general nauseous feeling and the maddening sound of incessant Wurlitzer music. (Random stats: your AL average Right Fielder holds runners to their base 45% of the time, your average Twins Right Fielder holds runners to their bases 27% of the time; The Bluth foundation has, to date, raised almost $50,000 to fight TBA and give us an honest to goodness player out there...)

D Matt Capps--As sure as the sun rises in the East, as sure as there will always be an England, Matt Capps will be around to drive us NUTS. At a certain point you feel bad for him, I mean how would you feel walking into your job, with 30,000 people fairly certain that you are going to fail? But then again, if you don't fail, then people won't feel that way! (Random stat: Matt Capps has thrown a strike in an 0-2 count only 40% of the time this season...I know it's a small sample, but no other Twin has that bad a rate)

We feel the same way...

DANGER ZONE

F Francisco Liriano--If I were teaching Francisco Liriano I would be calling home at least once a week, begging parents to come in for an intervention. I'd be begging administrators and colleagues and even other students for some idea about what in the heck to do for him. And I'd probably be just as dumbstruck as the Twins coaching staff is now. The deal was if the Twins got good performances from Mauer, Morneau and Liriano they might be sniffing contention...two out of three isn't bad, but it's not nearly good enough when Frankie has gone from "Lira-no-no" to "F-Bomb". Seriously please direct all advice on how to help this man to the Twins front office before they start placing want ads for exorcists. (Random stat: 98% of all bloggers analyzing Francisco Lirano's stats have no idea where to begin)

Any grades you feel like handing out? Leave them in the column below and vote for the grade you give the Twins season so far at the right.

Happy thoughts

Looking over my tweets and blogs from the first week of the season there's a surprisingly snarky streak to them all. I'd always thought of our little outpost in the Twins blogosphere as a happy place, and yet it seems like the stinktastic 2011 has colored our perspective on the team's early struggles.

For example, on Thursday I turned on the game over lunch, in time to see that the Angels had already run up a 5 run lead. A student came into my room to hear the score and then joined me in a 5 minute commiseration of an already woebegone season. Two hours later, as I took the track team for a work out the Twins had fought back to tie the game. An hour after that, students and teachers and others walking down the street were bouncing along elated at a win, and a win that featured homeruns by Mauer and Morneau no less.

I felt terribly guilty and vowed to be more optimistic for the series against the Rangers (after all, we have some sort of mojo that has bedeviled Texas (and very few others) for two years now) and yet, the more I watched the snarkier I became. 

For instance, while I was quite pleased with the Twins' signing of Ryan Doumit over the offseason (he was switching from my 2nd favorite team--Pittsburgh--to my first after all), I was significantly less impressed as he took a flyball off the gut in the field, and grounded into double plays with a consistency not seen since Delmon Young. 

I bemoaned another injury to a pitcher, pointed out the awkwardness of Chris Parmelee's "bat-drying" technique, I even picked on hapless middle relievers Jared Burton and Matt Maloney for their doofy hipster beards.  Honestly, how could a game that's supposed to be fun turn me into such a crank.

So I'll try to be enjoying the game more freely today as I go to Target Field for the first time. I will not mutter about errant throws, or insinuate that I know more about who to sign than Terry Ryan (the guy has been in baseball longer than I have been alive after all). I won't huff and puff over strike threes or boo one of our own (I doubt that any player hears it and suddenly goes: "OH! They DON'T want me to play like I have been!! Boy do I feel silly!")

I do however reserve the right to tell the Twins to avoid bases loaded situations. In the immortal words of Rebel Leader Admiral Phinneas Q. Ackbar:

Bases loaded and no outs? Looks like they've got us right where they want us

Think happy thoughts everybody!

Deja Vu All Over Again

After three games in Baltimore things look a little grim for the Twins. After last season's stinkfest fans are carefully attuned to the ups and (especially) the downs. So every little foible fels like a harbinger of another doom-tastic year.

Cheer up Charlie...or Lexi...
(Credit Patrick Semansky Tri-City Herald)

Not to encourage the pessimists, but it sure seems like the 2012 Twins are emulating the 2011 Twins as much as possible.

Impotent hitting with Runners on base: CHECK!

Lack of quality starts from the rotation: CHECK!

Goofy errors at the worst possible moment: CHECK!

Flukey injuries to seemingly healthy players: CHECKMATE!!

Unfortunately it doesn't get much easier for the Twins as they embark on a 16 game swing against sure fire playoff contenders: Los Angeles, Texas, New York, Tampa Bay and Boston. If you play like that against Baltimore...well...yikes...

Tomorrow, the Twins' home opener will begin at the same time that I'm taking our High School track team on a long distance slog. And while some might say that watching the Twins and running long distances are exercises in futility, I'll gladly do both because no matter how you feel at the beginning, the middle, or the end, it's the journey that makes it worthwhile.

These Season Previews are Not Yet Rated

We really appreciate those intelligent, dedicated Twins bloggers who can analyze the minor league invitees, pick apart pitching motions and scrutinize batting stances until the Twins' prospects for the coming year can be understood by anyone with half-a-brain.

But we aren't those bloggers. 

To us Spring Training is less a time to be studied and obsessed over and more like a trailer for the movie. Unfortunately, it's a trailer that goes on past the end of the average fan's attention span. So, if you've blown off checking out the Twins and Twins analysis until now DON'T WORRY!! We've got you covered with the following trailers! Just check out whichever one best meets your attitude as a fan and you'll be well prepared for the months ahead.

Trailer 1: For Optimists

Trailer 2: For Pessimists

Trailer 3: For Realists

Whether you're an optimist, a pessimist or a realist please vote in our poll at the right to help us know just how the denizens of Twins territory are feeling as the season gets started.

Home Sour Home

So the Twins, our loyal boys in blue, are spending the next few days in Chicago, which must come as a relief after having to spend 11 whole days at home.

I'm not quite sure why, but the Twins sure didn't seem to enjoy their respite from the road. In the 9 games the Twins lost this past home stand they averaged 1.5 runs & 6.5 hits per game, that's clearly down from the season overall, where they've averaged 3.8 runs & 8.4 hits per game. But it's not all declines against the season average! In those same 9 games the pitchers went from averaging 9.5 hits & 4.4 runs per game to 11.8 hits & 6.1 runs per game. (Note: I tried to find a more Sabremetric-y stat as per my older brother's suggestion but I'm still a novice at that...suffice to say: "something, something, something, you'd be better off putting Larry, Curly and Moe at the bottom of the order than Tosoni, Tolbert and Butera")

But enough of this silly math stuff. Clearly the Twins have lost track of what makes playing in Minnesota so special. It's not the number of pretty girls who profess their undying love for Joe Mauer in sign and shirt form. Nor is it the giddy kids, seniors and drunk guys who always find something to cheer for even in the darkest days.

Perhaps it's because they're working, instead of watching tv during the games but perhaps they simply have missed this catchy jingle espousing the greatness of the Land of 10,000 Lakes:

So next time you're in town we encourage you guys to do the things advertised in this ad and more. Perhaps Brian Duensing needs to go camping, maybe Jason Kubel could take a kayak out on Lake of the Isles, maybe Ben Revere and Alex Burnett could start an emo/hip-hop fusion band (hemo?) or maybe our local renaissance man, Michael Cuddyer, should make time for a trip to the Minnesota Renaissance Festival.

Whatever the case guys, please come back ready to win some more games...it's a little tough to watch when you play like Joe Mauer sings. For now, just beat the White Sox and we'll all be happy.

(I'm sorry, that was mean and not constructive...but seriously Joe, I thought singing four part harmony was part of Minnesotan citizenship. Maybe you can slip some voice lessons into your offseason routine.)

It Came From Baltimore!

As if having to endure the Yankees over the weekend wasn't bad enough, the Twins just had to confront the Baltimore Orioles for four games. I don't know what it is about the Orioles, perhaps it's just my imagination, but whenever we face the little black and orange birdies we play a little worse than we normally do. Normally it's not bad enough to lose, or bad enough to get swept...this time it was.

So how did the Twins get swept by the worst team in the American League? How did we manage to drop four straight games to a team whose best pitcher in the series has a mighty 7 wins, and 4.15 ERA? We can't say for certain, but we would bet that it might have something to do with a conversation in the team clubhouse before the first game.

Ben Revere: Oh man!! We have to play Baltimore...Those guys give me the willies!!

Jason Kubel: I know man! Have you ever seen any David Simon tv shows?

Revere: Sure!

Kubel: Man, I just had a Homicide: Life on the Streets marathon, and I'm just getting into The Wire...That city is Crime Central! I bet the whole Orioles team and all their fans are a bunch of criminals and murderers and bad guys!!

Gardy: Jason...those shows are fictional, that's very specious logic and I'm pretty sure Baltimorians can now sue you for libel and slander.

Kubel: You might be right Gardy...but just to make sure that they don't get mad I think we should let them win!

Everybody: YEAH!!!

Gardy: Wait...no! That's a bad idea! Guys, we should try to win!

Francisco Liriano: I don't know Gardy...I'm not sure I can stand to see the big-bird-head logo...it's eyes follow you where ever you go in a room. It gives me the heebie jeebies!

Brian Duensing: Yeah, and I have a totally irrational fear of every bird ever since I accidentally stayed up to watch The Birds when I was 6!

Gardy: Why did you watch The Birds at 6?

Duensing: I thought Big Bird & Snuffy might be in it....

Jim Thome: Yeah, that movie's freaky, and let's not even talk about the ominous thrill of terror that reverberates in the hearts of men when you read one of noted Baltimore resident Edgar Allan Poe's ominous tales of horror!!

Kevin Slowey: Or the fact that their version of cake....is made out of CRAB!?!?

Drew Butera: Let's face it coach. Baltimore is terrifying. So if we all just play really really badly, maybe they'll all take mercy on us and not destroy the Twin Cities.

Everyone: [Random murmurs of agreement] Great idea! YEAH! Let's do what the guy back up catcher batting .163 says!!

Gardy: [Rubbing bridge of his nose] It's gonna be a looooooooooong series...

And it was. Kubel's terror of David Simon tv shows left him 1-13; Thome's panic over Poe left him 0-11; and Drew Butera went 1-12. The pitchers didn't fare much better: Liriano was so spooked he left after 2 innings with an injury, Duensing was so traumatized he left after 2 innings and 7 runs, and Slowey held his Crab Cake anxiety in check to get a lead...and then give it all back in a 5 run 5th inning.

Good news though, no more Baltimore! And since the Twins appear to be trading Jim Thome to the Indians, we can now officially focus on helping him win his first World Series ring by doing what we do best: breaking the hearts of Tigers fans.

Smells Like Lutefisk, Ya Know?

It was Lutheran Night at Target Field.

This caused several problems. First of all, the EMTs were in over their heads before the game even started when fans began passing out left and right due to wearing Norwegian Sweaters in the 90 degree heat. Secondly, in a sudden reversal of the principles of economics, prices of back row seats shot up 300% because nobody wanted to sit in the front. There was also great confusion when fans tried to sing grace before eating their hot dogs and were unsure whether to "strengthened for thy service be" or "feast in paradise with thee" -a brawl actually broke out in section 214. There was also the 4 part harmony dramz during the national anthem (there were too many sopranos), and the fact that many people were so reluctant to rudely walk in front of one another that they simply refused to go to the restroom at all, which resulted in an unfortunate stinkyness throughout many sections of the stadium.

Down in the dugout, Drew Butera was trying to figure out what to do. He had just gotten in touch with his Norwegian self, and he realized that ordering Pavano to throw certain pitches was not very Lutheran. He decided instead to make "suggestions" to Carl, and then if he didn't like what Carl threw he would call Ben Revere later to complain and maybe also to gossip about Luke Hughes.

Danny Valencia, meanwhile, was having a conniption. "But GUYS," he said. "It's LUTHERAN NIGHT. We can't just score runs against these guys, they get beat up by the Yankees and the Red Sox all the time and it just...it wouldn't be very nice."

"Well," said Cuddy, as he smiled extra-bright and his dimples shone like an exploding supernova. "What should we do then? I mean chances are we're going to hit the ball occasionally and probably get on base sometimes."

Joe Mauer chimed in then - he'd been thinking a lot about this Lutheran niceness and such. "How about I'll wait until there are 2 outs before I get a hit? And then probably no one will score, so we won't make the Orioles feel too bad."

"Gee," said Danny. "That's a great idea! And then maybe we can guilt them into letting us win!!" It was too brilliant (and too convoluted) to fail.

Or not.

And that is how the Twins got smacked down by the Baltimore Orioles, 4-1 on August 22, 2011. There was also some serious fan interference, and some extremely un-Norwegian behavior exhibited by Gardy (awesome) but the important thing you must remember - we lost tonight because of passive-aggressiveness. And also lutefisk.

The Most Constant Presence in Twins Territory

You might not recognize the fellow at the top of this post, but he's been around all season long. So long in fact that he might have been asked to pinch hit when our bench was particularly thin last week. His name is Dissotiera Injuria, or in layman terms, "the Injury Bug".

How much of an effect has the injury bug had on the Twins season? Put it this way: in 126 games the Twins have had 107 line-ups. By comparison the Yankees have fielded 53 squads in 123 games. We're on a pace to have 137 different sets of 9 take the field, that's 137 combinations of players wearing the Twins' red, white and blue. If the entire population of Dassel, Minnesota put on Twins jerseys, they could make that exact same number of rosters.

And hey, who's to say that Dissotiera Injuria is done yet? We must be about due for Danny Valencia to twist an ankle rounding first, or Alex Burnett to dislocate a shoulder in an innocuous warm up session, or Carl Pavano to snap a tendon while packing his suitcase for the next roadtrip, or Drew Butera to spontaneously combust.

Honestly your guess is as good as ours. In this wild season, where few things are certain, the only thing we would bank on is that Gardy will lead the league in Tylenol consumed and the Dissotiera Injuria is going to be around until the last out is recorded.

Gains from Trade

As we learned in Economics 101, both parties in a trade should feel as if they are gaining something. This has almost nothing to do with what I'm about to write but I figured I should at least try to establish some credibility before writing something totally ridiculous, so I threw some economics terms around to make myself sound smart.

After tonight's game, we can't help but wonder - when will Dread Pirate Nathan finally get sick of this, yell "ARRRR!" and swashbuckle Capps down into the briny sea with the Kraken?

After one tweeter posted something along the lines of "The Twins should trade Matt Capps for a handful of those Subway 50-cents off a 6 inch sub coupons," we wondered what else would be a fair trade for our ninth-inning-disaster-maker.

TOP 10 THINGS WE SHOULD TADE MATT CAPS FOR

1) A rock - rocks are useful as doorstops and paperweights, and they don't generally blow saves.

2) One Peanut M&M - Peanut M&M's are amazing - one might actually be too much.

3) Michelle Bachman - it would get her out of politics, and she probably has a secret 95mph fastball.

4) A Minty Toothpick from Rudolph's BBQ - those are some good toothpicks

5) Shah-Ruk Kahn - A trade for the gloried Bollywood star would definitely be weighted heavily in our favor, but Shah-Ruk could really help the team with his impeccable hair, sexy dance moves and boyish vulnerability. Win!

6) Some pocket lint

7) The chance to punch the Klondike Bar ad executive in the face

8) A Backstreet Boys CD - I've been having a hankering to listen to "I Want it That Way" but my copy is missing.

9) Magic Beans - hopefully the previous owners would not recognize their magic properties, and we would get the chance to climb a beanstalk and steal some golden shin guards from Joe Mauer.

10) Pavano's Moustache - we want it back

... in all seriousness though, I have to give props to Gardy for sticking up for his players. Even though I don't always agree with him, I do always respect him.

A few things

Oh hey guess what, it's still raining! But that doesn't mean things aren't still happening... like Morneau is on the 15 day DL. That is a thing that happened. Also Nishioka might play today...that's another thing that could happen. But, like I said it's still raining so we might not play today at all.

As of last week, I am a working lady again - done with school and back into the real world. It would appear that the real world consists mainly of making powerpoints and spreadsheets - so just for giggles I made a spreadsheet comparing last year's starting lineup with this year's DL. Not to alarm anyone, or anything but check it out:

So yeah. That's all I really have to say about that. I haven't died - I still write for this blog (yes there are actually two of us... although I've been pretty MIA for the last few months), but now there will be much more stealth posts from work and fewer Twitters...Tweets...things... yes.

OK back to real (non-baseball) spreadsheets.

MAKE IT STOP!!

After yesterday's loss--which I did not see but which was described to me by my father, fellow blogger and friends as: "a hosing," "a total screw up," and "completely f*ing ridiculous"--I'm reminded of the great quote from Casey Stengel (the dentist turned mediocre outfielder turned genius manager of the Dodgers, Braves, Yankees and Mets): "I been in this game 100 years and I see new ways to lose 'em I didn't know existed before"

That has been the Twins season in a nutshell. When not losing on a record setting bullpen implosion, we manage to lose on three errors by the same shortstop (even when we keep changing the shortstop throughout the season), or on suddenly impotent hitters, or four umpires completely misunderstanding the major league rule book. It's not even games, we lose players in shocking ways too: there was the flu virus that sidelined four guys for a week, feet that got injured while turning a double play, and leaping for a home run ball, and the mysterious "bi-lateral leg weakness".

I can't explain it. Nobody I knows can explain it. I might have doubted our ability to make the playoffs this year, but I never expected it to be bottom-of-the-majors bad (and neither did anyone else apparently). So I have no other recourse but to plea with the baseball gods, the bringers of spring and sunshine and hot dogs and those little frozen lemonade cups: please, for my own sanity, MAKE IT STOP!

Welp....

That loss was extremely frustrating to say the least. As Gardy said in the post-game last night, an unfortunate inability to hold onto a 3 run lead overshadowed some great performances by a number of players and, especially, an amazing and heroic return to the lineup by Jim Thome. It's really hard for me to continue paying attention to the game when it becomes so depressing and stressful, so my mind starts to wander to thoughts of unicorns and butterflies, or occasionally Harry Potter.

Which leads me to this point - has anyone else noticed the striking similarities between the Twins bullpen, and Dementors? If not, I will list below the resemblances below:
- They suck all the fun and joy out of life.
- They make you feel cold and dead inside.
- They ruin everything.
- They often cause the loss of sports matches, such as Quidditch, or Baseball.

So this leads us to the obvious question - who is Voldemort? My first thought was Trevor Plouffe, mostly because I kind of hate him right now and wish he would go away so we could bring in another infielder who is actually capable of not screwing something up in every single game. But then, I remembered the second purpose of this blog (besides Twins silliness) - making fun of the Yankees. So then I decided that Voldemort is probably Derek Jeter, because really don't we always need an excuse to blame something on Derek Jeter?

"But wait," you say. "Isn't Derek Jeter already a vampire?"
Why yes. Yes he is.
Does Voldemort also drink Unicorn blood, making him also kind of a vampire?
Yes.
Is Drew Butera, in fact, a unicorn?
Yes.
Does that last fact have anything to do with baseball or anything else?
Not really.
I rest my case.

Now, I will go buy a bottle of scotch to drink away the frustration.

Snakebit

Yesterday my mother, die-hard fan that she is, seemed close to tears as she tried to explain why the Twins have lost so much this year. Finally she just said: "they're just snakebit."

After this weekend it seems like a pretty good descriptor. How else do you explain losing despite loading the bases in the 9th, trailing by one run with Kubel and Morneau coming up? or losing with our two best relievers coming in with a three run lead in the 8th? or losing on a sac-fly that scored a man who reached third on a feeble groundball booted by both the shortstop and center fielder? One way or another we seemed destined to lose on a single tricky play that loused up all the hard work that came before it.

But rather than bemoaning this series, or the dumb flukey luck that seems to go against us every other day, I'd like to take a moment to note one thing that got under my skin. In the fourth inning Juan Miranda hit a home run to give the D-backs the lead, now I'm not going to complain about Miranda or the gopher ball, or the loss--but I will complain about the fan who got the ball (you can see his reaction here).

Clearly this grown man was happy that he caught a baseball, happy that his team was on it's way to winning it's 6th straight game, probably happy that he had gotten to drink some beer. But why, on earth did that inspire him to look down at little Ben Revere and shout "YOU SUCK!"? (He also boasted of this to local broadcasters--as twitter confirmed)

Really random Arizonan? Ben Revere sucks? Do you realize that Ben Revere plays baseball in the major leagues while you pay for the chance to watch him? Do you realize that, even as a rookie, he has more hits in the major leagues than 99.9% of other Americans (including you)? Do you think the he sucks because he was unable to jump 25 feet in the air to rob Miranda of the home run? Does he suck because he doesn't own a jet pack with which to take away that home run you caught? If Ben Revere sucks because of any of those things...then pretty much everyone sucks...including you. Seriously this guy really makes me want to change the "ck" in Dbacks to a "g"...but this is a family blog...so I'll let you readers do that yourselves.

In a just world, this idiot would get his comeuppance, Ben Revere would prove he does not suck and the Twins would come away with a win. But instead, we remain as we have been all season...snakebit.