Be Careful What You Wish For

For the last two years, the general hue and cry from Twindom has gone something like this, “Jesus Christ, trade some of those young pitchers for someone who can hit!”.

And, I don’t mean to speak for the masses here, but I believe the call was for someone who hit with his man bits and not with his vagina.


Well…it’s morning in Minnesota, and Bill Smith’s reply to our call was “Why don’t you shove Carlos Gomez up your ass. Small Market's in the HOUSE”.

We’ve not only traded one of best young pitchers (a trade I kinda love), but we’ve now managed to make Boof Bonser our 2008 Opening Day Starter. Whoops!


Can you tell I’m mad? I mean, can you really tell? How about this…watch this clip and then you’ll probably understand. I’ve never been to Turkey, but I’m seriously thinking about going.


Let me be clear…I LIKE the Matt Garza trade. I LIKE the prospect of Delmon Young hitting the ball all over Carl Pohlad Memorial Stadium. I wasn’t mad when we traded Luis Castillo and I believe NOT paying Torii Hunter 90 million dollars, even though it made this website’s name obsolete, was the RIGHT thing to do.

But don’t those moves highlight in big, glowing, Joe Mauer-pink neon the absolute NECESSITY of re-signing Johan Santana???

Here’s what every Twins fan should be asking this morning…”What’s the fucking plan, Mr. Smith?”

Are we really to believe this team is ready to compete for a title now? And, assuming the answer is “No fucking way”, when will we be competing? Are we waiting for Justin Morneau to be MORE in his prime? Am I missing a BEVY of young players in the minors that are two-three years away that are going to make all the difference?

This feels like a move that is two days late and 25 million dollars short. If the team was willing to part with Garza, why not last year or the year before when a trade would have produced a hitter that could have helped us get over “the hump”? If we’re re-building, then why not trade Joe Nathan at last year’s deadline for young players? And, most mind-numbingly important of all, if you were willing to give Johan 4 years at 20 million…why not five? Or how about four years at 25 million? Jesus. Mary. Joseph.

So...What’s the fucking plan, Mr. Smith? More moves to come? Trading Nathan at this year's deadline?

Until this becomes more clear to me, I’m sorry, but I am forced to give you a special, mandatory TWT nickname.

We’ve officially gone from The Quiet Genius to a Man-Lady named Phuck.




(By the way…in all seriousness…I can’t wait for the season to start. Go Twins!)

(Oh…and this was supposed to be a Farewell Johan post. Well fuck that…but my favorite Johan memory is probably the duel with Curt Schilling when he struck out six of the first seven hitters )

(Or maybe it was win he gave up a MONSTER home run to Big Papi in the World Classic )

(One more time)

Pay that man his money

Eric Gagne signed for 10 million. Dollars.


Just give him the fucking money already, Bill.

Irony, Thy Name is Devil Ray

Well, my overwhelming impression of the Tampa Bay series was, in the immortal words of Homer Simpson...meh. No wait...strike that...snuh. Pick any psedo-sensical word you want, the fact is that it was a very blase series for the Twinks, and today's off day seems welcome, if not for the players then for the collective psyche of the fanbase. The series was so blase, in fact, that it caused us here at TWT to do a bit of an overhaul -- call it spring cleaning if you will -- nothing drastic. Any future aesthetic suggestions can be placed in our comment box, as usual (the one marked "Queer Eye for the Webmaster Guy".

The irony of the last four games was that the two losses came on the backs of arguably the two most stable guys on the team -- Santana and Nathan.

What does this say to us overly analytical types? Well, nothing really. Coincidence is the best answer in my guestimation. Those guys are going to have their radar screen blips, and they just happened to come against a blipping crappy-ass team like the D-Rays. At home. With them running the bases as if for the first time. It's tough to sort through what is "young" behavior and what is just good old fashioned inferior genetics when it comes to athletics, so I have a problem automatically drinking the media Kool-aid about the ups and downs of a baseball team undergoing a youth movement like the Rays. We hear all about them being "talented but young" early last week, but I'm not sure that's what we saw so much as a slight choke job by our squad. It might turn out that this group of young Rays is just bad. Nathan, frankly, got bailed out earlier by Crawford's unbelievable base-running gaff. In fact, it was so bad, I'm not sure gaff is a good enough description. It was a flat out flurge. I just made that word up. The fact is that even when you're not playing at peak form as a team, you gotta step up in close games and win them, no matter who you're playing.

Still, my optimism is not entirely crushed. It's going to take a whole lot more Mauer groundouts to second (teeing one up for Hops) and Punto hissy fits to do that. And I know Nathan and Santana are going to be fine. Ponson's control has me somewhat worried, but not as much as his decision in hair stylists. Ortiz just can't be this good the whole season, but if he's anywhere even close, I'll take it. Boof and Silva I don't have the energy to discuss. If there is a silver lining it's the fact that there are many division games still to come, and maybe we can get in some kind of groove by then.

Back. To the Future

Hey sports fans. Remember me? Well, I'm back and badder than ever. Badder than toddler grammar. I'm Color Me Badder.

Pooh has been admirably holding down the creative fort here lately, but with the arbitrary benchmark created by some long-forgotten Roman having recently passed, I figure it's time for a founding father to finally chime in during the long off-season.


I know that the potential gyro(ball) sandwich marketing opportunities in Boston have never been more rampant, and that Zito's overhand curve swooshes and swashbuckles with million-dollar ferocity, but the price tag on starting pitching this off-season has been shocking and the single biggest story of this winter of our discontent (halloffamefbidrugscandal what now?). They are Tiffany Crystal. And I'm sitting here trying to take back the Silva my sister got me for Chrismtas to Kohl's to get a refund on the sale price, while searching for parts on ebay for original discontinued Radke models. You know, the one with real tears?


While I can't help but think that the contract negotiation in San Fran involved an errant zero or two which no proofreader or lawyer caught, it causes great fear to the baseballing part of my brain. Here we sit, Twins fans, on the precipice of the most hope-ridden season in recent (or all) Twins history. With an impending outdoor (they can play baseball outside?) stadium, and an F-bomb repacking his warhead with enriched slideronium, the near future of the Republic of Twin is Rayban bright. Even while Terry Ryan (rightfully) does his best Rip (Van Winkle, not Torn or Hamilton) impersonation. And yet I sit here with a profound dread.

How much would Johan Santana be worth on the open market right now?

If this question, and others like it (with the names Morneau and Mauer subtly substituted) don't cause you fear, perhaps you're too busy fearing fear itself, or the reaper. Or maybe I underestimate the importance of luck and timing in major league sports. Maybe I have been buying hope options in great big piles, hoping to backdate them to 1991 prices (thanks for the tip Steve Jobs!). Or maybe I'm finally starting to realize what being a small-market team really feels like, after so many years of just thinking it meant you had to really, really suck. All the time.

(Ir)regardless, I feel....a great big....something...on the horizon. And it's almost here.