Category: Sports

  • Three Cheers for the Spurs; Two for LeBron

    Among the more contrarian aspects of my sports fandom is an aversion to hyperbole in general, and Big Events in particular as a means of describing and defining the games I witness. It’s probably a snobbish impulse, because Business 101 tells us that supersizing anything is the way to bring in the casual consumer, and…

  • Nice. Nice. Very Nice.

    Wasn’t that swell? Isn’t it always a fine thing to see the local nine kick the living snot out of those shitheels from Chicago? And wasn’t it comforting to see Ramon Ortiz get his feet wet coming out of the bullpen, in a situation where there was absolutely no pressure? He did a nice job,…

  • Jolly Good

    Just a quick note on what felt like a very necessary win accomplished in absolutely necessary fashion, or something like that. After Friday night’s 13-inning affair –a game that featured another shitty performance from Ramon Ortiz and valiant comebacks that ultimately came up short– the Twins desperately needed to give their beleaguered bullpen (Pat Neshek…

  • Some Puzzling Questions For An Off Day

    I don’t quite get this: The Twins have two guys in the AL top ten in home runs, RBI, and slugging percentage. They have a leadoff hitter who is eighth in the league in batting average. The club is second in the American League in fielding percentage, fifth in team ERA, fifth in RBI, fifth…

  • Game Two In Texas: That There's The Team I Imagined Back In April

    Tonight’s game, along with last Friday’s win in Milwaukee (Bonser’s 11 strikeouts, Hunter’s grand slam), was a blueprint for the kind of team I thought the Twins were going to be coming into the season. Sort of, anyway. It still perplexes me that the guys in the middle of the order are being forced to…

  • Random Stuff From The Weekend In Milwaukee

    You’d sure like to see your team hold a 4-0 lead, particularly since the Twins have had so few early leads of late. And, yeah, Dennys Reyes is the lefthanded specialist out of the bullpen –or was– but he hasn’t done much of anything to justify that position thus far in ’07, and his stellar…