Congratulations and moment of silence

I realize that today is now double-posted, but a couple of things have happened that I thought I should mention:

1) Congratulations to former Twin Shrek I mean David Ortiz on winning the homerun derby! He's not my Canadian Hot-Pants fiance but he's close enough (p.s. now that I have an actual fiance, maybe I should stop refering to Justin Morneau as my betrothed...? Maybe...?)

2) I'm sure if you've read the news recently, you heard that George Steinbrenner, owner of the New York Yankees, passed away this morning from a massive heart attack. Given that most of my knowledge of Steinbrenner comes from two sources - the book "The Devil Wears Pinstripes" and the ESPN miniseries "Summer of '79" - I'm not exactly the best source for actual facts or unbiased opinions, but I thought I should say a little something.

For as much as we've made fun of the man here at PFH, there's no denying that he has been one of the most influential club owners of all time. Whether you loved him or hated him, you were sure to have an opinion. Steinbrenner oversaw the launch of the all-Yankees TV network (whether you like it or not, a game-changing innovation in revenue streams for ball clubs), hired and then fired his own manager umpteen billion times and won approximately 85 world series titles. OK, most of these are exaggerations, but the fact remains - Steinbrenner was a giant in baseball, and now he is gone.

RIP, George Steinbrenner. Your empire lives on.

More than a feeling:

So it’s the half way mark of the baseball season and we here at Peanuts from Heaven are full of...oh, what’s the word....cautious optimism? optimistic caution? gas? Is it gas? It’s probably gas...

Oh no, wait I recognize this feeling. It’s the slow realization that we’re in for (yet another) barn burner of a second half. Once again the teams in Detroit Rock City and Deep Dish Pizza-ville stubbornly refuse to let us win...no matter how many cookies we send to their residents, or pictures of sad puppies we post to make them feel guilty.

This isn’t a bad thing I suppose, exciting baseball beats boring baseball any day of the weak. The only problem is that it really seemed like we might just cruise through the season this year, what with that whole kick-ass start to the season, and the actual victories over the Yankees...we might have been looking too far ahead, we admit it, but well, you’ve got to admit, it would have been nice to just have an easy year for once.

Instead we’re back where we’ve so often been, nipping at the heels of a couple other teams hoping that the breaks go our way in the second half. Now sure, there are statistics to support us. Odds are Joe will come back into form, and the pitching will regain its stuff, and Bill Smith will pick up one solid piece to help lead the charge towards October. And we could trot out all kinds of stats, like the fact that we’ve faced more teams over .500 than the Tigers or White Sox...and will, therefore, have a slightly easier road ahead.

But instead of, you know, rational logic, let’s do what we peanuts do best: Daydream!

In our magical imaginary 2nd half, Delmon Young will continue to confirm my man-crush and Nick Blackburn will once again use baked goods to combat the forces of evil and Gardy will once--at least once--push a merry little wheelbarrow out to collect Jesse Crain before Ze Ubermensch does too much damage to our leads. Also, the Tigers will trade Austin Jackson to the Red Wings (fast on grass, faster on ice!) and Ozzie Guillen’s new reality show will get a surprise twist when Flavor Flav becomes the team’s new GM. These distractions will beget our newest October fantasy: two whole wins against the Yankees!

Dare to dream little legumes, dare to dream.

Smelly

Two warnings

1--To the Detroit Tigers, please stop ruining our genius theory about how Scruffy is capable of changing the Twins fortunes.

2--To the Onion. We realize you love the White Sox and the Brewers...but c'mon...admit it...your mockery is based on jealousy.

PLEASE FORGIVE ME!!!!!

Oh Twins, my Twins...I'm so so so so soooooooo sorry

I have finally landed back in the United States and I turn on my computer to actually browse the internet leisurely for the first time in 36 days and what do I see...our once mighty lead and sterling record have....oh, what's the word...Exploded-into-a-bajillion-pieces! That's one word isn't it?

Now I'm sure that those of you who have actually, you know, watched the games have your own theories as to why this is, from what I can glean the hitting has been feeble and the pitching has been suspect and while I'm sure that playing the game bears a large effect on how many games you win, I'm also sure that the largest effect on the Twins performance is me.

Witness: 2007 (when I was in India)--no playoffs

2008 (when I returned from India)--surge into a tie for 1st place

2009 (here all year long)--Win the division

2010 (When I was gone for all of June)--Great...until the month of June.

I'm not saying I'm the greatest human being EVER...just the most important. But clearly our recent "June Swoon" is directly attributable to my being in west Africa throughout the month.

This is no one's fault but my own. I take full responsibility.

I beg of the Twins organization to return to their winning ways just as I have returned to the country. Pitchers can once again pound the zone. Hitters can go back to crushing the enemy. Gardy can continue being adorable when he's angry. As penance for my transgression I will say 20 "Hail Mauers" and eat as much crow as can be concealed in old dome dog wrappers. I promise, it won't every happen again, please Twins? Forgive me?

Annnnnnnnnnnnnnd we're back!!

Sorry everyone! Things have been a little hectic here at PFH - first we were traveling in India, and then pretty much as soon as we got back Scruffy took off for Ghana for 5 weeks, and I started my summer internship and also became consumed by wedding-related planning activities.

I'm a little out of practice at this whole 'writing' think... it's like when I'm out of town for 2 weeks and don't practice Yoga and then when I get back I realize my hamstrings are probably half the length they used to be, only it's my level of creativity and not my ability to contort my body into strange positions. See even my metaphors are weird now.

I'll just start with a simple exercise.

THE TOP THREE THINGS THAT TERRIFIED ME ABOUT LAST NIGHTS GAME

1)David Price. I've never seen him play before, but the man is a pitching ninja. His 90-gajillion mph fastball is so stealthy you don't even see it until it's gone past you, and when I saw how totally ineffective we were against him, I sort of got bad feelings about the whole game.

2)Gardy putting in Ze Ubermensch, Jesse Crain, in the 8th. I love Jesse Crain...he is a nice guy (see Twins Fest 2009), but you would think that Gardy, a man who seems to have his head on his shoulders, would realize that 9 times out of 10, when you put Crain in, really bad things happen. I'm pretty sure there's some sort of statistical analysis linking Jesse Crain's pitching with sad puppies but I'll have to look into it further to be sure. And even though the recap made it look like he mowed them down, in person it was much more of a nail-biter.

3)The John Rauch intro video. At first I just when 'what?'...and then I was like "oh wait... this is for real??!" and then I started laughing because what else can you do when someone's freaky neck tattoo is being dramatically lit on a giant screen while Metallica plays in the background? I still can't decide whether I think it's totally awesome or the strangest thing I've ever seen, but mostly I'm leaning towards totally awesome. The best part was when he started out a little shaky and my mom goes "...maybe they should play that video again. he's cute!" MOM??!????? WHAT?????????????

If you haven't seen this particular bit of awesomeness you can watch it here, but it really doesn't do justice to seeing it on the awesome scoreboard. Did I mention the scoreboard is awesome? Let's do a little comparison, just for fun...

vs.

...and just as Target Field wins, so did the Twins also win, 2-1 over the Rays and it was a great night at Target Field! We are now 1-1 in the series...I'll make every effort to watch the game this afternoon and report back, and be a decent blogger once again.

- Stinky

So much news!

Wow...so...busy day in baseball yesterday:

Ken Griffey Jr., the man who made baseball (and wearing your hat backwards) cool for a generation of young boys has retired, right before we played the Seattle Mariners. We might be tempted to claim that Griffey acknowledges that he is no longer as cool as Joe Mauer and is now passing the torch of awesomery to Captain Sideburns, but the truth is that Ken Griffey Jr.

competes with no man in terms of coolness. He is to our generation what Willie Mays was to our parents, a reminder of our chance to experience eternal summer, joy and passion. He's a great ball player and will be missed--though I can't help but wonder if his career would have been longer if he'd just laid off the nerve tonic.

While the Kid retired, the Twins got hosed out of a win, and as much as I might like to foam at the mouth about that it beats getting hosed out of a perfect game as Armando Galarraga did in Detroit. We normally don't mind it when the Tigers are inconvenienced, but when you play well enough to get a perfect game it's a shame when human error ruins that.

To be sure, it's hard to be an umpire. I did it for little league baseball for one summer at age 13 and have not endured as much profanity since. I'm willing to give umps the benefit of the doubt, to indulge them and forgive their mistakes because hey, it's all part of the game.

Would the game be better if we could eliminate every umpire mistake? Maybe. Sure it would be nice to know that justice was always done (like in Judge Dredd), it would also be boring (like Judge Dredd).

So we urge Major League Baseball to adopt the official Peanuts from Heaven proposal of turning all umpires into super intelligent logic based cyborgs. If possible, give them laser vision. We understand that there's an inherent risk that the cyborgs will eventually run amok and take over all the world...but then we'll just unleash the power of Care Bear Attacks.

Something Cool overshadowed by something not

Jet lag is a fickle thing and much as I would have loved to watch last night's victory (our fifth in a row!) I literally could not keep my head upright so I will likely miss out on this week worth of west coast games and simply remain an eager box score watcher in the mornings after (highlights too).

But without doubt the highlight of the game (or the recaps anyway) was the fact that the box score included this little beauty: Cuddyer 2b.

Michael Cuddyer played second base...or in honor of the adorableness that is our big right fielder playing a position normally manned by individuals who look much more like hobbits than he does. Anything that shows off Michael Cuddyer's coolness is normally rewarded with a glowing paean on this blog, but today that homage is tempered with a little anxiety.

You see...I, Scruffy, have come to love Orlando Hudson, against my better judgement. You see, I know that O-Dog is awesome, that he's hitting over 300, that he's setting the table for Mauer and Morneau, that he's helped stabilize the defense and may have played some role in helping Delmon Young overcome his fear of pop flies (They aren't actually exploding insects, like Delmon originally thought). But as awesome as it is that Orlando does all those things, he also talks...a lot...even when it seems like no one wants to hear what he's saying. As many of my friends will no doubt confirm, I often do the same thing.

So in short, I feel like Orlando Hudson is my brother in bombast. And as cool as it is that Nick Punto and Michael Cuddyer hatched a secret plan on the team flight to put Cuddy at 2nd Base, that coolness is tempered by the boiling tea kettle of anxiety I feel when O-dog isn't on the field, because if O-dog isn't out there, then what's to stop our team from behaving normally and thus becoming (shudder) just another baseball team.

Perhaps I'm exaggerating the gravity of this sitaution (wouldn't be the first time). But at the very least I just want to say: "Get well soon Orlando Hudson" and if you need anyone to talk to...well..you know where to find me.