Stage 1 Complete

This photo reprinted without permission from Star Tribune dot
com, so suck it lawyers.

I'm the One They Call the Big Papi

With my in-state co-conspirators alternately wrapped up in fruit and financial planning pursuits, I've been left to fend for myself somewhat this week. All alliteration aside (whoops), Tuesdays With Torii (can't stop) pauses with pursed lips (damn) and breaths a heavy sigh of relief and proclaims the playoffs a done deal (okay I'm done, I swear). We're in baby. I'm writing my, in the words of the great Zoolander, yougoogily for the Bitch Sox right now. What was YOUR fondest moment and how shall we choose to remember them in the afterlife?

And in my comrades literary (but not spiritual) absence from TwinsMania, my thoughts turn to our remote cousin of the north and Red Sox lover, affectionately known as Pooh. Sure it fills me with glee to see Torii regain his...er, well...let's say return to a form we have long desired but which has eluded us through ankle injuries and compensating for said ankle injuries lo these many months. For Torii these streaks are fervid and flimsy, the consistency of a soap bubble you don't dare to touch. But his recent surge could NOT have come at a better time for our fair team and has, as Mauer and Liriano before him, provided an individual spark serving to ignite the piranha kindling elsewhere in the lineup. I hope this campfire keeps burning well into November, long after we have splurged on Smores and accidentally fallen asleep in front of it. No real risk of forest fires in October anyway.

The Pooh Sox however, are a horse of a different color right now. A bloody sock red. They are battered and beaten, and while my Twins-loving heart doesn't mind catapaulting into a division title, it does hurt just a little that we do it in Boston, that Yankee celebrations come at our hands, and that I must cheer for Big Papi ineptitude for inertia. Because you see, I don't love Big Papi, I'm IN love with him. He hit a landmark 50th homerun last night and got a well-deserved curtain call. I got the same warm kind of feeling seeing that, as during other notable curtain calls in the Dome this year (Joe Mauer 5 for 5 night; F-bomb's last pitch) -- knowledgeable fans recognizing greatness. These moments are even better, however, when the person in question is a just a flat-out awesome human being. You won't hear about any fuzzy feelings for certain other former Twins who might be in that situation. They shall remain nameless. I'll call him simply A. J. to...you know...protect his anonymity. Sure Big Papi is The One That Got Away. He's the 41 in a 30 on Terry Ryan's otherwise perfect driving record. But there is no love lost for Papi from Twins fans, and I for one get a particular joy from seeing him excel. Even if it isn't for my team.

Here's hoping you hit 10 more this season Papi Gigante. And if a non-Morneau has to win the MVP this year, here's hoping it's you. No tengo tiempo para Jeter.

And now for something completely different...

....a segment we like to call: Jogging Diary (it'd be a Running Diary, but my knees don't work so well anymore, so I can't really run). More or less, this is probably what I'd say to Hops or Smitty if they happened to be sitting next to me watching this game, but now you dear reader have to suffer through it.

Event: Jogging Diary of Twins vs. Red Sox, Game 1
Date: Tuesday, September 19th (all times are CST)
Location: Comfy lime green couch in front of new 42" high-def plasma TV (aka. Nirvana)

6:00 pm -- Whoaaaaa Nelllllyyyyy!!! Welcome to casa de Kaiser where we're coming to you semi-live from my laptop computer. We're starting a key six game stretch on the road against Pooh's suffering squad, the Scarlet Stockings. Does anyone in Beantown care about this team right now since there are no more Yankees games on the schedule?
6:07 -- Top 1st: Cuddy takes a 79 mph fastball for strike three. Seriously, how crazy does a knuckle ball have to be to have a sub-80 mph fastball be an effective "counter pitch"? This guy is a carnival ride. He's the windmill in the minature golf course that is major league baseball.
6:16 -- Bottom 1st: Crisp lines out hard to Bartlett and mutters something under his breath. My best guess is a that he's doing some kind of furtive Bert Blyleven impression. Coco Crisp, Milton Bradley, and Boof Bonser. Best names in baseball and newspaper headline writer everywhere's best friends. Garza sails through the inning.
6:21 -- Commercial Break: I discover this article. I'm as shocked that the first transplant of this kind was attempted in China as seeing Torii Hunter take a first pitch strike. Ditto for Lew Ford seeing action in the playoffs.
6:24 -- Top 2nd: Morneau hits a lead-off double off the Green Monster. Taking notes east coast-biased sportswriters? Rondell White follows it up shortly thereafter with an RBI single off said Monster and P.T. Wakefield is struggling early. He then proceeds to throw two wild pitches, although one was technically a walk. The moral, as always: being Doug Mirabelli sucks ass. Is there any other person who is so typecast in baseball and has such a specific role? The only possible exception I can think of is Matthew Lecroix in his comic relief role as catcher. That gets the job done every time. Bartlett adds a three-run home run on another "sneaky" fastball. Piranha, my ass. I hope my running diary momentum doesn't run out.
6:46 -- The Burgundy Hosiery go down quickly in the second, and Garza is looking solid so far. I read somewhere today that he is getting something like 1.0 runs per inning in run support as a starter this year. Tummy Ache's getting like what...10 per game or something? Yeah, gimme the youngster for the post-season, Silva second half "resurgence" or not. Every game down the stretch magnifies every performance, and Silva still seems more trend than mirage to me at this point. Garza at least had the butterflies excuse to explain away the first couple starts.
6:49 -- Top 3rd: Morneau singles to right for his second hit. How many does Papi have tonight? I forget. I'm sure he'll read off his boxscore for the assembled media after the game though. As well as the box scores of all Yankee players except for Derek Jeter. Hunter with a two-run shot that is a line drive over the wall. Those seats above the Monster are dangerous tonight. Hope they have insurance up there. Or some seriously reinforced cupholders.
6:53 -- Hey hey! It's the Ron Coomer show! Coomer almost gets hit by a foul ball, boyishly asks Scotty Ulger for a glove on camera so he can defend himself, to which Bert replies, "We've seen you field Ron. You're probably better off without one." Coomer than goes on to explain how he had so much success hitting knuckleballers. I believe it had something to do with Schlitz Lite and an Armenian prostitute named Mena. But I may not have been paying full attention. Twins lead 6-0.
7:01 -- Garza cruising. 45 pitches. He's Corvette-like.
7:04 -- Seriously. Go read that article I linked to earlier. That's the funniest thing I've read in awhile. He lost his pediddly in "an unfortunate traumatic accident". My mind is racing with possibilities.
7:05 -- Top 4th: Loretta makes a nice play at second on Piranha #4. Tim Wakefield is really "showcasing" his spectacular Red Sox defense. Way to be a team player.
7:07 -- Wakefield is taken out after walking Piranha Punto. Good effort. Some call him....Tim.
7:08 -- MSNBC article update. It took a "15 hour microsurgery" to attach the unit. Sure, rub it in. The guy just went through an unspecified trauma for christ's sake!
7:10 -- I just saw the graphic of the Fenway park footprint on Gamecast (for stats, you know). Man that park has got some messed up shit going on. No wonder Torii hurt his ankle there last year. He probably got lost in the outfield looking for that fly ball. Baby Jesus grounds out to end the half-inning.
7:14 -- David Ortiz makes a case for Justin Morneau for MVP by striking out on a bad check swing, just after Bert makes a Garza and Ortiz comparison. Talk about bad karma. (they both once played in Ft. Meyers)(For the record, so have I)(but it was ultimate frisbee)
7:17 -- Matt Garza is a cruise missle.
7:21 -- M-V-P! M-V-P! Third hit for Morneau.
7:23 -- It's raining. Finish the inning! Finish the inning! Strike out Torii Hunter! I KNOW you can do it! Damn you Torii! (single to right) Is it good when I'm honestly debating whether it would be a good thing for Rondell White to tap into a double play on purpose right now? (and he tried, but Loretta f'ed it up)
7:30 -- Garza gives up a single that was drilled to center, and a line shot to left immediately after ,to lead off the inning. I don't like to be the kind of guy that cheers for an inning to be over and a game called because of rain but given the circumstances here at the end of the year, I can't really be blamed, right? Right? I thought Garza was cruising! I was going to call him the Royal Garza Caribbean and make jokes about food poisoning and getting lost at sea. (sob)
7:38 -- All right the good ship Garza only gives up one and the game is official. Now, where is Mark Walberg and that perfect storm?
7:39 -- More from MSNBC. The donated organ was from a 22-yr old brain-dead man. I guess he was thinking with his you-know-what too much. (bum bum bump) The appendage was 4 inches long. (insert own joke here)
7:49 -- Ortiz hits a foul ball 763 feet to oohs and ahs from the Fenway crowd before striking out to Garza. I feel Morneau for MVP momentum building. In the other race, Mauer is 1 for 4 and Jeter is apparently 0 for 2 elsewhere.
7:58 -- Garza strikes out two, but gives up a run and gets yanked. Probably for the best because the only other "cruise" references I can think of are Tom Cruise and Santa Cruz, and I can't figure out how to connect them to 22-yr old rookie pitcher Matt Garza. Good work, young man.
8:04 -- Back to the MSNBC article. It describes the wife's "psychological rejection" of the new...er, wang. Isn't that what they call "marriage"?
8:07 -- Morneau gets his fourth hit, and somewhere Bob Ryan is suddenly confused about who to vote for. Please reference earlier MVP conversation. Seriously, if JustinTimeToGetScrewedByTheNationalMedia gets his average to like .340 and the Twins win the division will he get serious consideration then? Hello? Hello? Is this mic on? Twins up 6-3 heading into the bottom of the 7th.
8:19 -- Detroit-White Sox update. The hated A.J. hits a grand slam to put the Sox up 4-0. As I said before, I'm all for two Pale Hoes victories in this series, so kudos to you sir. The always popular take-care-of-your-own-business-and-don't-worry-about-others conversation starts up in the broadcast booth. Love that one. Oh wait, no...it makes me want to vomit in my own trachiotomy hole.
8:26 -- Random thought: Does Ortiz need to do that spit-on-the-hands thing before he bats when it's downpouring?
8:27 -- Yes.
8:29 -- Rain, falling. Reyes, dominating lefties. Urge to write, fading.
8:33 -- (feigning interest)
8:38 -- Reyes gets a big double play but gets taken out after giving up a single. Call me crazy, but Reyes might end up being the biggest x-factor for the Twins in the playoffs, especially if they play the left-handed-batter-heavy Yankees (or A's for that matter). You heard it here first folks. Let's go Rincon.
8:46 -- Varitek is up as the tying run. That rain delay is seeming like a pretty good option right now. Punto with a HUGE catch on a foul out. Love that guy.
8:59 -- Speaking of loving that guy, Justin (MVP) M(VP)orneau (MVP) gets his 5th hit (MVP) and 3rd double (MVP) of the night for an insurance (MVP) run (MVP) in (MV(MVP)P) the (MVP) ninth (you get the idea). That would be 5 for 5 ladies and gentlemen. I love THAT guy.
9:10 -- Twins win. Twins win. Nathan gets a little work in in the ninth (striking out Ortiz to finish), Morneau is good, and I have a man crush on Nick Punto. Elsewhere, the defending world champs are winning, and we may be 1/2 game back in 20 minutes or so. Optimism flocks to Twinsland like the salmon of Capistrano.

All right, I've probably blathered on long enough, but I'm willing to call the debut of "Jogging Diary" Liriano-like in its early success and promise for the future. My speculations are sliders. My metaphors change-ups. My linking to MSNBC articles.....disturbing (ulnar ligament tears?). All kidding aside, Justin Morneau may have done himself good by having a huge ballgame in a slightly larger setting than the Minnesota Medialopolis. Like I said earlier, everything is magnified late in the season, and having huge games in key situations is a good way to get noticed. Taking the "Morneau for MVP" position would be just the kind of anti-stance that seems typical of many sportswriters. Come on Bob Ryan. Start writing that column.

Peace in the middle east.

State of Twindom

I have to say that one of my favorite parts of this season has been the National League wild card "race". I guess, if I was to be picky with my vocabulary choices, "race" might not be the best choice. Hence the quotation marks. It is less like a race and more like an election so far, where we choose to support the lesser of evils just to watch them get blown out in the general election, and in this case all the kooky party candidates are still in the running for the primary. The candidates that college kids snicker about and dare their friends to vote for. In the NL even Green Party candidates San Franscisco, and the Free People's Movement of Florida Marlins still have a chance, and they were 20 games under five hundred this year. Everytime Baseball Tonight throws up that NL wild card graphic on the screen I giggle just a little. And then make sure my roommate wasn't looking. By the way, I'm pretty sure the Chicago Cubs are the Hamas of the National League -- everybody loves them but they just can't get the job done.

Meanwhile far away in other part of town (Ruben Carter and a couple of friends are drivin' around), our beloved Twins seem to have a strangle-hold on the AL wild card, and it seems like only Mike Sweeney can pry our fingers off its neck. Maybe a couple of guys named Schilling and Beckett could factor into it too, but it seems as if they may have blew their emotional wad early just trying to be spoil sports for the MFY's. Baby Jeesus and his batting title hopes thank you. But seriously, I'm more frightened of that four gamer at home against the Royals than the prior two series at Boston and Baltimore. This version of the Twins has been SO plucky in difficult situations, in games they're not supposed to win, and in games against pitchers they've had a history of losing to, but then they go and blow a few of the "easy ones". The Royals series preceding a final homestand against the Sox seems like such an easy situation to be in "Let's just beat these chumps these four games easy and build an unsurmountable lead before the Sox get here" mode. Dangerous.

This stage of the season also brings another interesting debate to the forefront. The Ligers have a three-gamer against the Sox today, tomorrow, and Wednesday, raising one of my favorite debates...the "Who do we cheer for?" controversy. As if the sheer force of our mental fury could cause Pierzynski liners to take bad bounces over Brandon Inge's glove. Maybe this is what meditation is really all about, although the lack of Olympic gold medals in highly meditative countries probably belies that argument. And if it did work, I bet you would have seen an inordinate amount of yoga studios springing up in Boston prior to 2003. For my part, avoiding the Yankees in the first round seems like a sliced-bread level brilliant idea at this point, especially given the possibility of a Radke recovery and an A's matchup. When is winning the division something you want to ever avoid anyway? So I say we're looking for a 2-1 series win by the Sox -- good for them and good for us, but not TOO good for them. And we still get to play (crush) them the last three games at home where the Twinks have been the best team in baseball this year, Silva and Baker look surgent (as opposed to REsurgent), and Johan has been unbeatable, and looks like is in line to finish the series off. But would we rather have him start Game 1 of a playoff series?

To the Yankees, Tigers, White Sox, and A's I say...
Bring it.

Preguntas

Will the Twins lose another game?

Answer: Yes, but only because, having already clinched a playoff spot, they will forfeit the last three games against the White Sox for fear that A.J. will “fall” into every hitter causing a rash of sprained ankles.


Is Jason Tyner the best DH in the game right now?

Answer: Yes, but only because David Ortiz, in an effort to garner MVP support, has decided to become the Red Sox new closer.


Who’s up after Torii Hunter?

Answer: The other team. (sorry Torii, I love that one)


How many slider’s will F-Bomb throw in his first start back?

Answer: One, and Gardy will pull him.


Will Justin Morneau win the MVP?

Answer: No, he’s Canadian. Not eligible

And We'll See You Tomorrow Night

The Twins took three of four from the Tigers (and one from the A’s) and currently find themselves 1 ½ games out in front of the wild card chase and 1 ½ games back for the division lead. The offense has shown signs of life, our pitching staff is still The Best In The Game and Joheezy is suddenly finding himself smack-dab in a Mid-west bias created battle for the MVP. Love it. Love it. Love it.

Despite all this, I’d have to say that the most important recent baseball event is the fact that I am now an official collector of Twins bobbleheads.

Okay…”collector” is a tremendous stretch, as I have no intention of ever doing this again. But there I was, at 3:00 on Saturday (6:10 first pitch) standing in an already amazingly long line waiting for my turn to be handed a child’s knick-nack version of Jack Morris. (Having never done this before, I didn’t know that showing up three hours before gametime is the equivalent of being “fashionably late”)

As one of the 400,000 people that actually attended Game 7 of the 1991 World Series, Jack Morris has always had an odd place in the sports ventricle of my heart. Absolutely hated him when he was with the Tigers…loved him for most of 1991, particularly for 10 innings that October…and then hated him again when he ran to Toronto.

Things that go through your mind while standing in a really long line with other delusional adults waiting for a child’s toy:

“How long have these people with stubble and lawn chairs been here?”
“Why aren’t there any beer vendors?”
“How frightening is it that the two old guys behind me know SO much about high school football. Is there somewhere I should be turning them in to?”
“Ohh…right…THIS is why my wife decided to stay at home.”

In the end, very little of my pessimism seemed to matter.

While watching the Saturday game of the last Yankees series with my dad, we both heard (for the first time) the advertisement for “Jack Morris Bobblehead Day”. As one of the other 400,000 people at that game, he looked at me as soon as the ad ended and, without missing a beat, said, “you’re going to that game”. Please notice the lack of a question mark.

So I find myself in brief possession of recreated plastic glory. Brief, because in less than 24hrs Mr. Morris will find himself in Texas…on the desk of my father, nodding along to the vibrant rythms of the insurance business. Do they make Bobble-Armadillos? They should.


Best of luck to Matty “Please God, Let Me Win ONE!” Guerrier tonight.

Team's done, I want mine.

I love Papi. Who doesn't and if you don't, then you must hate puppies as well. I was alittle disappointed to read the follow article on ESPN.com regarding Papi's thoughts about the MVP race in the American League.

I think it's safe to say that it's down to Dye, Morneau, Konerko, Papi and Jeter (always have to have a Yankee in the mix). All have their arguements for and against, don't really need to re-hash that as it's basically the same stuff every year. I was surprised to see Papi basically say that the Boston line-up isn't near as good as the Yankee line-up.

"Don't get me wrong -- he's a great player, having a great season, but he's got a lot of guys in that lineup," Ortiz continued. "Top to bottom, you've got a guy who can hurt you. Come hit in this lineup, see how good you can be."

The best thing about these comments is anyone can go to a site and see if Papi, well, might be looking at it the wrong way. Out of the 14 teams in the AL, here is how Boston, Chicago, New York and out beloved Twins rank in each category:

Stat NY Boston Chicago Twins
HR 3 5 1 13
RBI 1 5 2 8
Runs 1 4 2 8
TB 4 7 1 9
2B 6 5 10 11
SLG 4 7 1 8
Hits 2 8 2 6
AVE 1 10 2 3
OBP 1 2 5 6
OPS 1 5 3 7
ERA 6 11 9 3

Papi, you will get votes. Sorry to say, Jeter will get votes as well. It's not like your team doesn't hit and does score runs cause you do. Maybe the cash cow should have spent more money on good pitching and not trade Hanley for anything. Maybe D Wells was good regardless of the fact he was hurt. You've got 14 or 15 game winners in Clement and Beckett, not really that much more. Schilling is 89. Put it together, you need pitching.

By that quote, Morneau should be the clear favorite. Who's more important to the team?

The Post In Which You Get To See Lohan Boob (like you haven't seen it before)

With the next phase of the season beginning, the series with the Ligers that starts tonight is starting to take on Fat Bastard-level heaviness in my mind. As you may have gathered from random roller coaster rantings from me in the past, things tend to ebb and flow in the miasma between my ears, and obesity of ideas is a recurrent issue. Anorexia of ideas, I'm hoping to implement soon. But I think this one is for real.

I've heard all matter of pundits comment on Silva's somewhat odd outing last night. Both odd because (gasp) he actually pitched out of his gourd for the first time in phases. But also odd because of the way it ended -- as prematurely as Lindsay Lohan's "next Laren Bacall" super-stardom. How's THAT going for her (and how about wearing undergarments occassionally?) 59 pitches through 6 innings and then "inexplicably" takes himself out of the game. To read the quotes from the manager and pitching coach, it came out of nowhere. But I've heard elsewhere that the management was well aware ahead of time that he was feeling under the weather going into the game. As stated by Carlos though in the above-linked article:

"I'm not feeling good the whole game, and shoot, we have the best bullpen in the league," he said.

I find that hard to argue with even given, 1)Silva's taken himself out under "questionable" circumstances twice before this season, and/or 2)Common baseball wisdom is that you want your starter to go as long as possible in order to preserve the pen, no matter how good they are.

I'm still with Carlos. But maybe not for any of the reasons listed above. The real reason we should maybe be grateful for his vomitousness is that it exposed a troubling, dare I say, pattern? Neshek is living up to his original minor league billing: "Pat Neshek! One Night Only! Watch him mow down righties, but struggle to get lefties -- at least after he's in the league long enough for big league hitters to catch up with his Crazy Ass delivery" This is not a mirage people. Thank god Jessie Crain has found it a bit. I think Neshek is firmly ensconced himself in the Situational category, which is good because I hear Denny Reyes was getting lonely.

A squandered quality Silva start aside (you weren't really expecting to win that game anyway, were you?), this Detroit series has me all a'twitter. I'm getting a little veclempt just thinking about it. They're struggling. We're struggling. And somehow, we're 1/2 game up in the Wild Card, and 4 games back in the division, with the big dogs in town, and Santana finishing off the series at home, where he's been more invincible than Superman in a panic room. Let's just struggle a little less then them the next four days.

A few addendums:
Here's hoping Carlos passes around those awesome pills to Boof and Garzy.

And speaking of awesome.

*Warning* This Post May Cause Unintended and Irrational Positivity

The season is over for me. No, not really…but this phase is.

This hasn’t been a straight-forward season, and, for the purpose of my very survival, I’ve mentally divided the season into separate but incredibly unequal parts.

The first phase let’s call “Unbridled Optimism of the Spring”. This is when the team reports to Spring Training and all of last season’s problems have been burned off by the magic of a really Hot Stove. This phase is also felt by Kansas City Royal fans, rendering it meaningless.

This year, the second phase was titled “Yeah, My Team Sucks”. I’d rather not dwell on this phase.

Then…oh my god then, the Twins and I went way down yonder on the Chattahoochie. Not only did we learn how to swim…we learned who we was…we learned a lot about living…and a little ‘bout love. That’s right, right now I love this team, and their sudden ability to wake-up and piss excellence. And I very much want it to stay that way…so I’m ending this phase, “It Couldn’t Possibly Get Any Better…Could It?”

Everything from here on out, not even spider monkeys, can dampen the stone cold fox of a ride this team has taken me on.

Home Stretch

By far the best thing NASCAR has given to pop culture is the term above, with the possible exception of Ricky Bobby (Shake and bake, baby. Shake and bake). But as the last landmarks of summer slip away, and I have once again begun to pore over Twins online print, it has just occurred to me that that's where we are. The home stretch. And I am officially praying to little tiny baby Jeebus, as we speak.

Of course no one would want to see what the Twinks are up to in The Trop yesterday, so I was loyally and diligently GameCasting myself into a tizzy over 1) the ascendance of Boof (good title for my first novel), 2) a baffling lack of recent Twins O(h crap another dp)ffense, and 3) 6 Flags of Rondell White (you've never been on a ride this frightening), I was reflecting on the Twins remaining games and once again starting to feel very, very optimistic.

It can't last.

Once the (once mighty?) Ligers are stared down and split with, and another home series with Oakland, there is a mighty nice little stretch of games before the Showdown with the Sox to finish the season. It goes like this: 4@CLE (given up), 3@BOS (imploding - sorry Pooh), 3@BAL (that guy can't hit three home runs in a game again, right?), 4vs.KC (is it good that this is the most worrisome series of this stretch? Here's hoping for an influx of minor league "talent" to the KC roster before this). Not too shabby.

I am chartreuse with optimism.

(it's like 'green with envy' silly)

Anyone But...

After the second straight Red Sox Weekend Debacle, (and it was apparently even worse than a mere sweep:

[I]f you follow baseball, you know what kind of weekend it was. In a nutshell, the Red Sox were as pathetic as pathetic gets. Friday in particular was perhaps the worst major league game I've ever seen - the Red Sox made the kind of errors that one usually only sees in Little League.

Of course, there was the notable instance in July 2004, when after another Sawx collapse in Seattle, Papa Pooh described them as "beer league." This insult seemed to galvanize the club, and we all know what happened next...Ok, not a chance...) I needed a little chicken soup for a baseball fan's soul. The Twinks taking 2 if 3 in Chicago helped some. As did the fact that BabyJesusJoe Mauer was getting MVP props on ESPN radio last night. But really, what I really needed was some good old fashioned Yankee Hate.

Enter ESPN's Jim Caple, and his rather unhinged polemic "The Devil Wears Pinstripes". Yes the jokes are recycled (Steinbrenner is an ass; Billy, Mickey and Whitey were drunks; Joe DiMaggio (referenced primarily as "Mr. Coffee") was a total prick and Jeter sleeps around), but that doesn't stop the from being funny.

Plus it's occassionally nice to be reminded of exactly why the MFY's are so easy to hate. Remember in 2004 when the Devil Rays were late arriving to a game in NYC because of a hurricane. And the Yankees demanded a forfeit victory? Against the Devil Rays. There is also the evil of the YES Network (AKA Yank-Jazeera) including the absolutely egregious homerism of all Yankee announcers.

In the end, not a great book, (it reads like the world's longest Page 2 column, longer even than a "think-piece" by Gregg Easterbrook) but it reminds me that even my Sawx tank, and the Twins battle for the Wild Card, no matter what happens, I'll always have a team to cheer for. Whoever is playing the Yankees.

Twins = Freedom!

Word

All I need is a PB&J sandwich

It's was July 1987 and my family was making the move back to the Twin Cities. I was sitting on the floor off our new kitchen, eating a PB&J sandwich watching the movers and various family members bring in box after box of dishes, towels, clothes, linens and most importantly GI Joe equipment. Not toys, equipment. Honestly, I was not very excited to move from the hallowed halls for Fellows Elementary School in Ames, IA and needed something to get me excited about this new house. That spark, that excitement, that edge of your seat anticipation was provided by some unlikely neighbors. I like to think of them as "Our Squad", most others know them as Puckett, Gietti, Hrbek, Brunansky, Gagne, Viola, Blyleven even Niekro and Reardon. The upcoming run to that Twins first World Series title and subsequent cold, but oh so delightful ticker tape parade (and day off from school) hooked me to this sport.

We are now in the midst of something very similar to that summer of 1987. This new group of Twins has me feeling so optimistic. We are again chasing the Tigers (now mighty again), with the Twins coming off a disappointing start to the season. Our hometown leader's name is Mauer this time around and his out-of-town hitting partner is played by Morneau. Blyleven and Viola are now known as Radke and Santana. Randy Bush and Al Newman look a lot like Punto and Tyner. With the Boston and Chicago pitching staffs falling apart and Boston seemingly cracking underneith the pressure of the mighty Yankees (maybe the Curse took a year off), how sweet it will be.

All I need is a PB& J sandwich, some Doritto's, a glass of milk, a warm Saturday afternoon and Herb's voice calling the shots. It's like 1987 all over again.

Ticker Tape

Update to yesterday's post and latest market returns:

JWBJE up 6 and an 1/8th

LLE holding steady and awaiting stockholders report on Friday

Here's hoping Carlos Silva's sinker is the only thing hitting bottom tonight.

Breather

The Twinigmatics are more recondite than usual of late, and no doubt enjoying a nice rest (or siesta for the Venezuelans) here on the one day of the last 32 in which the schedule gods have decreed baseball shomer shabbos. Despite some claims to the contrary, those of us at Tuesdays With Torii are NOT in fact, jumping ship or wagon. We feel entitled to our emotional outbursts of a roller coaster nature, yet still exist as fanatical day-traders in the market of hope run by Terry Ryan and Ron Gardenhire, which has been more bearish than bullish of late. For sale right now, hope futures with good long-term potential like LLE (Liriano Left Elbow), RLRFG (Radke Last Run For Glory), JWBJE (Johan Will Be Johan Eventually) and STELATS (Short Term Emotional Let-down After Tiger's Series). The prospectuses (prospectum? prospecti?) we read tell us not to worry -- the Sox and Sox have issues too. We don't make snap decisions. We don't jerk knees. We keep the faith and rely on long-term returns. Put me down for 10,000 and I'll call you next week to put some more Garza's away for my first-born's college education.

If You're Not First, You're Last

Syzygy, it's not just for female college ultimate players anymore.















No, this time it was stars aligning -- stars in the form of emergent white dwarf Justin Morneau and super giant Joel Zamaya throwing pure stellar wind and black hole gravity bending curveballs from which not even Pedro Serrano post-"F@#* you Jobu" could escape. A nice post over at Gleeman on the significance of Morneau's performance thus far and potential place in Twins history. Killebrew was the Tyco Brahe of astronomical Twins power hitting and Justin is following very copernicilliously in his footsteps so far.

Speaking of black holes -- er, sucking rather -- this happened last night too. Apparently (I don't want to hear about) Papelbon is not so supernova-like after all. If the Royals getting our backs isn't evidence of some bizarre cosmic machinery, what is?

Even the star-fillled, over-hyped, Ursa Major of baseball is helping out the cause now.

Will we finally get to see some big flaming gas balls from Matt Garza this weekend? Smith will get another start on Saturday, so I'll put the over/under on Garza's appearance at about the 3rd inning.

A whole post full of astronomical metaphors and I didn't once mention Randy Moss's full moon. Aren't you proud of me?

Elbow Juice

Is that the Twins playoff chances I see in that hearse?
Star Tribune today.

Statheadz, Bitches

Since I haven't thanked the Twins for Big Papi yet this week, allow me to do so in a roundabout fashion by bashing this post bashing Papi's clutchness. Now, I'm on board with you if you are going to argue that conventional baseball statistics don't prove the existence of some form of "clutch hitting" ability.

The problem is, when you write your anti-Ortiz screed, you probably don't want to run directly contrary to many of the points made in the book advertised at the top of your page. Especially when you are trying to make stathead arguments...

For example, Sussman makes the standard "lineup protection" argument:

Also, if the pitcher opts not to pitch to Ortiz, he'll have to answer to the next batter, Manny Ramirez, another extremely dangerous hitter. The timid closer has to pick his poison, and usually he chooses Ortiz over Manny plus a baserunner. Meanwhile, Pujols' backup hitter is Scott Rolen, another great .300 batter. But who instills more fear: Rolen or Ramirez?

If you swapped Pujols' and Ortiz's red uniforms, the clutch moments would be the same.

I'm not doubting the Great Pujols, but first of all that's an asinine counterfactual. Secondly, "Baseball Between the Numbers" specifically debunks the lineup protection canard. From two directions - first it notes that there are almost no situations when it makes statistical sense (and not just 'max runs sense,' but Herm Edwardsian 'win the game' sense) to "pitch around" somebody that occur in an actual game. And those situations which do occur all involve 2001-2004 Barry Bonds. Secondly, there are no demonstrable "protection effects" - hitters do not perform better with a better hitter hitting behind them - or at least there is no demonstrable effect of that nature.

And then there is the confusion of "what is clutch?"

And while Ortiz gets singled out as the greatest clutch hitter, Manny Ramirez is 16-for-44 (.364) with RISP and two out. The Mets' David Wright bats .368 (21-for-57) in those same situations. The Rangers' Hank Blalock is a stunning .400 (24-for-60) with more RBI than any of the aforementioned clutch hitters in those situations, but Blalock simply isn't a home run hitter.

And isn't it odd that clutch hitters seem to be synonymous with "hitting a walk-off home run?" Clutch should come in many forms. Blalock is living proof.

As far as it goes, RISP/2 out is a nice enough stat but A) small sample size, B) it counts runner on second with 2 down in the top of the first in a scoreless game the same as 2nd and 3rd, down one, in the bottom of the ninth. These are so obviously different that a metric which treats them equally is borderline useless.

Much better, I might suggest, is measuring performance as a change in the expected winning percentage before and after an at-bat. In a portion chapter from "BBTN" excerpted which was not reprinted by ESPN, it specifically discusses how Ortiz out-performed a generic hitter (with his raw stats) by, if I remember correctly, more than 7 wins. To put it another way, all other things being equal, if Papi distributed his very same performance in an average way, the Sawx would have been 7 games worse last year, missed the playoffs and not gotten swept by fat-ass Bobby Jenks.

All this is a rather long-winded way of saying that "BBTN" is a darn fine book - certainly a better presentation of the Baseball Prospectus approach than was the rather scattershot "Mind Game" - I've only covered a tiny bit of the content, which concern everything from Derek Jeter's overrated fielding (his nickname should be "PastADiving" since so many grounders are hit well...), Alex Rodriguez being overpayed (by a bunch, it turns out - though he came close to showing a profit for the Yankees last season) or whether a new stadium is 'worth it' for the public (answer? Hide your checkbooks, kids - a thunderous "no.")

All in all, a fine demonstration into just how far SABREmatics have come in breaking down the inner workings 0f the game of baseball.

We Got Trouble, Right Here In River City...

...with a capital 'T', and that rhymes with 'D', and that stands for....Disabled List?

Radke's shoulder, Liriano's forearm, Gardy's tummy, and Lohse's brain (oh right). What the *bleep* is going on here? Some numbers:

21-2 : Twins record the previous two homestands
19-2: Combined score of the first two home games in August

Stop sucking.

Trouble in Denmark? Is relief no longer spelled R-O-L-A-I-D-S, but G-A-R-Z-A? It sure as hell can't be spelled Mike Smith, even against KC. How will our heroes escape this nefarious situation?

Bert, The Hawk, Yount and McGuire

I know this is supposed to be a blog of our beloved Twins, but there are so many articles right now about Hall of Fame voting and whether or not the 2007 class will/should include McGuire. Rob Neyer of ESPN.com recently sent out a survey to a bunch of sports writers about this subject and commented on the results. I find the most interesting piece to be the comments left by those who returned the survey. Some good points (see Hoynes & Nightengale comments) and some bad points ("if not for the HR's, he wouldn't be HOF callaber" & "if you're not good enough for 1st ballot, why are you good enough for the 5th?"). Here's Smitty's take on it all:

HOF voting is like whether Courtney Olson or Anna Siebert is more attractive or whether a freshman should start at quarterback, popularity and politics. Whether or not McGuire took juice is not a good enough reason to keep him from consideration. If we assume he took steriods, we should also assume pitchers took steroids. Isn't that fair? Therefore doesn't that level the "playing field"? Why aren't more people questioning why 35 plus year old pitchers are dominating (Clemens), wearing blood socks (Schilling) and still way better then average (Mussina, Johnson and Rivera)?

One comment in particular made me call BS, "he was only an HR guy". Sure, that is what he was more known for, but let's look at some other all-time greats. Robin Yount is in the Hall. His numbers ant that spectacular. 250 HR, 1400 RBI, .285 BA but he has the hits. He was only a hit guy, only hit over .300 6 times in 20 seasons. Pete Rose was only a hit & run guy. Career average .285 (that would be higher if he didn't hold on for so long), he only stole 198 bases in 24 seasons, and hit 198 HR. Let's look at some similar players, McCovey and Killabrew. McCovey (22 seasons - .270, 521 HR, 1555 RBI, 1345 BB, 1229 runs) & Killabrew (22 seasons - .256, 573 HR, 1584 RBI, 1559 BB, 1283 runs) stats are very similar to McGuire's (16 seasons - .263, 583 HR, 1414 RBI, 1317 BB, 1167 runs).

To sound like the great Gammons: Look, my issue is not IF he should be in the hall, it's the rationale behind it. I don't think it's fair to punish McGurie for all the false comings of baseball, the owners and his peers. If so many players took steroids, including pitchers mind you, why not compare him to the rest of the players in his era? He surely was one of the more feared hitters in his day, was really a good fielder (over .990 for most of his career) and deserves serious thought. Neyer points out that there is no uniform opinion on the rules during this time and that fault belongs to baseball, the owners and The Players Association's. They should shoulder as much if not more blame for this mockery of the game.

To the person(s) who comment that "if not a 1st ballot, then never" I say do your homework and formulate your own opinions then players like Bert and Dawson so they won't be left off the HOF for so long. All they did was produce, produce HOF numbers and do it through out their career with class. If Yount, Gary Carter, Ryan Sandberg, Gaylord Perry and Don Sutton deserve to be in the Hall, the writers need to stop with the popular vote, do the homework and see these too need to be in the Hall. Oh, Anna and Courtney are equally as hot, I voted for Courtney. She plays volleyball.