With the Twins in town, I dragged four guys from my department out to Comerica last night to catch the second of the three game series. I had some coupons for half-price upper deck tickets from a scratch off ticket from an earlier game this season, but it could only be used at the gate. I figured, it was a Tuesday night game in Detroit. There should be no problem getting tickets. But then we got there — standing room only. Even if we only wanted one seat.
I swear I have an inverse curse following me around. Prior to my birth, the Twins had never won a World Series. Around the time I start to be cognizant of baseball, they start to turn things around and in ’87 they win the championship and repeat it in ’91. (As for the mid-90s Twins, apparently the curse wears off after awhile…) I move to Boston and when I first get there, walk up tickets are no problem and team is going through the most infamous championship drought in Major League history. After a few years — bam, another world series win and I can no longer easily get tickets to Fenway. Now I move to Michigan and the same thing starts to happen all over again — a team that sucked now has the best record in baseball and I’m stuck with standing room only because they’re suddenly popular again.
But it wasn’t really that uncomfortable. We parked ourselves in front of the Hank Greenberg statue in left center, where we had an excellent view of the bullpen and some room on the railing to lean against. The game started rough for the Twins with a Dmitri Young triple in the second that scored Magglio Ordonez, followed by a Sean Casey single to drive Young in. A good night for ex-Cincinnati Reds, observed the Ohio-native in our group.
But the Twins were not to be outdone last night, with a Nick Punto double and a sacrifice ground ball by my future husband, Joe Mauer*, driving in two runs in the top of the third to tie the game up at two. Things got a little hairy in the bottom of the fourth as Radke loaded the bases with no outs. But on a Craig Monroe fly ball to left, Ordonez tagged up on third and tried to score, but was no match for the arm of Jason Tyner who nailed him at home. Sean Casey flied out to center to end the inning and I was one of the few happy people in the stadium.
With that danger narrowly averted, the Twins took charge and picked up a run in the 5th on a pair of doubles by Punto and Mauer. In the top of the ninth they scored an insurance run to bring the final score up to 4-2.
Take that “Best Record in Baseball!”
* — Personal to Joe: Do you mind if we name our kids after members of the 2003 Red Sox? I made a promise.
Aug9
Colossus of Rhode 
I don’t know if Joe has a problem with naming children after the 2003 Bosox, but I do. And let’s remember, a promise to the RedSox Nation carries less weight than a government promise to the Native American nations. It’s not that it’s worthless, but simply that you can, at any point, turn it into a promise more favorable to you. And remembering the RedSox carries no virtue whatsoever.
However, I must admit that short of trendy names, the Twins are essentially bereft of cool names; lots of justins and jasons and joes, so perhaps you need to dig into the past and go with Harmon, Tony, Kirby, Kent, Cesar, Rodney, Baylor, A.J. etc.
Um, Joe is actually my future husband. But I guess I can spare him for a few nights. He and I are going to have beautiful children together.
🙂
There would be more spelling errors in this, but I’ve only had one drink tonihgt.