Written by A) I’m really glad the Twins got to go south to play this weekend because the weather here in MN is just plain being mean. It’s COLD out there.. and they say it might SNOW tomorrow? You know, it’s almost like Mother Nature knew that the homestand was over and decided to take a couple days off from the spring warm-up now that baseball is out of town. I’m glad that Mother Nature is CLEARLY a baseball fan but I will readily admit that I’m jealous as hell of the warmth and sunshine our boys of summer are currently enjoying. *pout*
B) There is a lot of ‘discussion’ since the lineups were posted about Mauer missing a second day in a row… WOW, can people overreact to the slightest thing. Come on folks, Gardy had already said that he was going to try to rest Mauer as often as possible and has also said that at the slightest hint of soreness, he is not going to play games with Mauer right now. And especially on a day when Pavano is starting and Butera has had a full day of rest, I think that it’s just as good right now to have him out there catching that speedy (except Damon) Rays lineup when they try to steal behind Carl – cause you KNOW they are going to try. Will I miss having Mauer’s bat in the lineup for the second day in a row? Well, yes, I certainly miss the potential but let’s be honest here, even Mauer has been struggling with the LowBA flu that seems to be running through our lineup. I say thank you Spanky & Kubel and let’s see the rest of the lineup start to knock the ball around a bit before we waste our energy freaking out that our $23 million catcher is permanently injured past the ability to perform before the second week of 2011 baseball has even ended. Sheesh.
C) Who the heck starts a game at 5:40 pm?? how weird is that?
| Minnesota | @ | Tampa Bay |
| Span, CF | Fuld, LF | |
| Cuddyer, 2B | Damon, DH | |
| Morneau, 1B | Upton, B, CF | |
| Thome, DH | Lopez, F, 3B | |
| Young, D, LF | Zobrist, 2B | |
| Kubel, RF | Joyce, RF | |
| Valencia, 3B | Johnson, D, 1B | |
| Butera, C | Jaso, J, C | |
| Casilla, A, SS | Brignac, R, SS | |
| Pavano, P | Shields, J, P |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | R | H | E | |
| Minnesota | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 12 | 0 |
| Tampa Bay | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 8 | 1 |
OUCH… that smarts..
Not often that both closers on a team each fail to make a save in the same game. Yet again, the blogger world is cursing the day of their births and declaring apocolypse. Somehow, I think that the sun will still rise tomorrow and Florida will be warmer than Minnesota and both Nathan and Capps will survive to close again.
On the other hand, wow, it was nice to see Pavano in classic Carl mode! He was ON tonight and really pitched a fantastic game. Sad to see his shutout put away but it was still a fantastic outing for the vereran and he proved once again why HE’s the one who gets our #1 starter position. It was just beautiful.
What it REALLY comes down to is that the Twins are going to have to start trying to win games with more than 2-3 runs. Let’s hope they remember that tomorrow.
[UPDATE] Mauer has been placed on the DL. Yeah, this could get ugly. Steve Holm (who?) has been called up to back up Butera.. so get this, according to Twins officials on Twitter, his injury is Bilateral leg weakness. Anyone care to decipher what the heck that is supposed to be?? Twitter once again answers my question: Bilateral Leg Weakness
Your new Twins catcher, Steve Holm
*sigh* I miss Red Dog…
Addressing Babs’ issues in reverse order:
C) In the Rays’ defense, they aren’t actually starting the game at 5:40… it’s 6:40 there. They actually start all of their home weeknight games at 6:40 until June, in order to encourage more families to bring their kids to games on school nights. They have real attendance issues down there and I don’t blame them for trying to remove any possible reasons people might have NOT to attend games.
B) I don’t have an issue with Butera catching, but I kind of expected to see Mauer DH’ing. Something smells bad here… I’m wondering if, as has happened a few times in the past, there’s something more going on with Mauer than anyone is talking about. I understand privacy laws and desires not to go public about some health-related issues, but on the other hand, IF you’re Mauer or the Twins and you choose not to share any information about what’s going on, you really have to expect there to be heightened speculation… especially when the guy has frankly sucked so far this season.
A) It sounds like I should be thankful for the 50 degree temps down here tonight. It’s breezy but I blew off going to Kernels games the last two nights because I was tired, so I feel compelled to brave the elements and go out to the ballpark tonight.
Finally, this from the St Pete Times:
New giveaway of the day
… the Rays will give away Sam Fuld Superhero Capes on May 29 to the first 10,000 kids 14 and under, replacing the canceled Manny Ramirez bobblehead giveaway. Fuld was flattered, saying it was the first such promotion in his honor. “I was maybe close to getting an Iowa Cub T-shirt giveaway (with the Cubs Triple-A team), but I didn’t even make the cut there,” he said.
that game SUCKED
what did we do to piss off the Baseball Gods?
and why did Johnny Damon of all people have to win the game
*not happy*
If Rays fans save their stubs, Can they get Cape Canaveral?