A recap of the 7th inning of today’s 7-3 loss to Oakland, accurate to the pitch, with apologies to Ernest Thayer

The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the ‘Sota nine that day:
The score stood seven-three, with but three innings more to play.
And then when Sweet Drew grounded left, and Sizemore threw to first,
A sickly feeling grew inside as Twins fans feared the worst.

A straggling few got up to go and catch the BART. The rest
Clung to that hope which springs eternal in the human breast;
They thought, if only Thome could get but a whack at that –
We’d put up even money, now, with Thome at the bat.

But Joe preceded Thome, as did also Ben Revere,
Cuddyer’s bat came third and Kubel’s batting clean-up here ;
So upon that stricken multitude grim melancholy sat,
For there seemed but little chance of Thome’s getting to the bat.

But Benny drew a four pitch walk, to the wonderment of all,
And Joe, the much belov-ed, tore the cover off the ball;
Cuddy took a strike, a ball, a strike, and fouled one off,
But then he watched strike three go by and sat down with a scoff.

With two outs now, Kubel rose and stepped into the box,
But Breslow’s pitch was low and wild and bounced near Jason’s socks;
And when the ball passed Kurt, and the men saw what had occurred,
There was Mauer safe at second and Ben a-hugging third.

When Kubel walked to load ’em up, there rose a lusty yell;
It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;
It knocked upon the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,
For Thome, mighty Thome, was advancing to the bat.

There was ease in Jimmer’s manner as he stepped into his place;
There was pride in Jimmer’s bearing and a smile on Jimmer’s face.
And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat,
No stranger in the crowd could doubt ’twas Thome at the bat.

Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;
Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt.
Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,
Defiance gleamed in Thome’s eye, a sneer curled Thome’s lip.

And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air,
And Thome gave a mighty swing, but couldn’t catch his share.
The second pitch was just as fast and Thome’s swing as slow –
“Well, now,” Jimmers mumbled. “Two quick strikes, dontcha know.”

From the benches, gold with jerseys, there went up a muffled roar,
Like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore.
“He’s old so strike the bum out!” shouted one drunk Oakland fan;
But Twins fans wouldn’t listen, they had faith in their man.

With a smile of Christian charity great Thome’s visage shone;
He stilled the rising tumult; he bade the game go on;
He signaled to the pitcher, and once more the spheroid flew;
But Jim held his bat back for first ball one and then ball two.

The Twins fans did remember how Jim hit five-ninety-seven;
That homerun in the third to put them up, well it was heaven.
And now they saw his face grow cold, they saw his muscles strain,
And they knew that Thome wouldn’t let that ball go by again.

The sneer is gone from Thome’s lip, his teeth are clenched in grit;
He settles back into the box, quite sure he’ll get a hit.
And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,
And now the air is shattered by the force of Thome’s blow.

Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;
But there is no joy in Twinsville – mighty Thome has struck out.

****

There was an inning eight and there was an inning nine;
But nowhere in those innings did they show a winning sign,
Oh, they had the lead but lost it when the A’s scored in the third;
And in the fourth Oak scored again and ’twas the final word.

Well, that game was less fun.

I went early and watched batting practice.  I don’t think I’ve ever been that close to Jim Thome before… that man is huge!  He didn’t hit 597 (HR) tonight, but he did have a double and single — and he even managed to score from second on a Delmon Young single.  Watching Thome “run” around the bases amuses me.  It makes me think I could be a professional athlete… if I also had hulking muscles and could hit 500 ft homeruns.  During batting practice, I watched as they took turns running the bases between their turns at bat.  While younger players like Matt Tolbert and Ben Revere busted their butts, Thome just kind of trotted — he really does look like a jolly Paul Bunyan out there.  But look at him crush this ball (for a single):

Unfortunately, Thome’s offense was about all the Twins had tonight.  By contrast, Oakland had it in droves and were helped out by some pretty terrible Twins defense.  The lowlight was possibly in the second inning when, after turning a double play, pitcher Nick Blackburn headed back to the dugout… except there were only two outs and a runner on 3rd who thought about scoring.  The Twins only had one error on the scoreboard — a muffed thrown from Joe Mauer to Tsuyoshi Nishioka that allowed Coco Crisp to steal not one but two bases in the first inning, which lead to the first Oakland run.  However, there were at least two other plays that were questionably errors as well: Danny Valencia missing a Scott Sizemore “double” down the line in the 5th which drove in three runs and Trevor Plouffe making a mental error, (over-)throwing to second on a hit and run when he had no shot at the runner.  Oh, plus Joe Mauer’s passed ball that led to a run… that’s five of Oakland’s 8 runs caused by Twins errors or pseudo-errors.  That’s the run differential right there.

Also, for the person who reads this that is enamored of him, Cliff Pennington had a double and walk, each of which led to him scoring a run.  I do not like your man Pennington, even if he does have a name that invokes images of British tea parties.

To end on a happy Jim Thome related noted, these pictures are from yesterday’s game.  If you don’t get it, go watch this first.

Tonight I traveled across the Bay to Oakland to see the Twins take on the Athletics. It was also the first weekend back for Twins broadcaster and new Hall of Famer, Bert Blyleven. Bert loves to talk about the large amount of foul territory in Oakland, and thus I made a sign… and as he is wont to do, Bert circled me! Check out the animated gif I made from screen grabs of my (very brief) moment of Twins fame.

Unfortunately, the guy in front of me chose my brief window of fame to get up and in doing so, partially blocked the sign. But it says “Circle me {Hall of Famer->} Bert… if you can find me past all this Foul Territory!”  My mother texted me to tell me she and her sisters (and my sister) had seen me.  After confirming that he was circled too, I think I made that kid in front of me’s night.

It wasn’t just the circling that made this game fun — the fact that the Twins beat up on the A’s 9-5 added to the enjoyment. The Twins struck first in the first on a two out double from Jason “Professional Hitter” Kubel that scored Trevor “I almost got his jersey” Plouffe and Joe “Milk Drinker” Mauer. The A’s answered quickly by tying it in the bottom of the inning on a two run Josh “Named like a Cricketer” Willingham homer. In the third inning, the Twins went ahead for the final time on a rather anemic display of offense — two errors leading to runners on first and third followed by a GIDP by Michael “I actually have his jersey” Cuddyer that incidentally scored Plouffe from third.

Just to prove that they had real offense left in them, the Twins scored again in the 5th on a Plouffe double, in the 6th off of successive singles from Delmon “Don’t make him run” Young and Matt “Morneau Lookalike” Tolbert followed by two walks to Drew “The Other Catcher” Butera and Ben “Damn, he’s fast” Revere. The Twins really put the nail in the coffin in the 8th with another Plouffe RBI double and a three run homerun by Cuddyer to go up 9-2. Hey, Onion, they figured out that two runs in one at bat thing.

The A’s finally scored again in the 9th on another Willingham homerun — this one a three run shot. This made the very nice Oakland fans next to me happy, so I was happy for them as long as Glen Perkins was in the bullpen to make sure it didn’t become a trend. Those same fans later gave me their extra turkey sandwich while we waited for the start of the postgame fireworks (inexplicably set to Broadway showtunes). Incidentally, this was the second time this season I went to see the Twins in Oakland and random strangers gave me free food. Seriously nice people in Oakland…

That’s not a typo… last night the Rangers beat up on the Twins with 20 runs.  The box score for the first 5 innings is the same as the zip code for Ft. Lauderdale, Florida: 3-3-3-5-4.

But if there is to be a silver lining in a game like that, it’s that in the 8th inning, the Twins held the Rangers scoreless under the pitching prowess of Michael Cuddyer.  Now, for those who aren’t Twins fans, you might not get why that is impressive.  This was Cuddyer’s Major League pitching debut — actually, I think it was his professional pitching debut.  While he did load the bases including a walk, he managed to get out of the inning with a 0.00 ERA. His velocity was clocked at 87 MPH, which isn’t half bad. I choose to believe that he was most throwing his own style of pitch, a relative of the cutter called the Cudder (get it?).

Except he’s not actually a pitcher. This season he’s mostly been filling in at first base for the injured Justin Morneau, but he’s nominally the right fielder.  At various points in his Twins career, he’s also played left field, center field, third base, and second base.  After last nights performance, he’s only missing short stop and catcher for the career cycle.

This brings me to a proposition… if the Twins are still languishing near the bottom of the division come September, Cuddyer should pull a Cesar Tovar and play all nine positions in the same game.  In fact, if they’re still languishing on August 26, he should do it… because I have tickets to that game.

And now I have finally been to a Giants game where I could cheer for them.
Except that I forget that the image I always had about California being hot and sunny is a myth when talking about San Francisco. I didn’t bring a sweatshirt and my t-shirt wearing self started to get cold in about the 6th inning. “It’s not so bad,” I told myself, “There’s only a few innings left.”
Except that the Giants tied it up in the 8th which led to extra innings — late night extra innings in San Francisco without a sweater, with the wind whipping off the Bay into the bleachers. When Nate Schierholtz managed to get to third base in the 12th with only one out, I was sure it was going to end.
Except that pinch hitter Cody Ross struck out followed by another pinch hitter, Pat Burrell, popping out. On to the unlucky 13th we went and that’s about when I really thought about leaving a game early for the first time in my life. My scorebook was already kind of screwed up since I ran out of room after the 12th and had to do some creative cramming and arrow drawing to indicate which at bat actually happened when. But I stuck it out… all the way through the 14th. Since 14 is twice 7, they did a 14th inning stretch and we sang “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”… again.
Nate Schierholtz, who nearly ended my pain in the 12th, had another chance in the 14th against former Twin and Minnesota native Pat Neshek. I couldn’t root against a Minnesotan, could I? As I struggled with this dilemma, Schierholtz made the decision for me by hitting a home run that plunked into the right field seats. Upon getting swept up in the cheers of the crowd — and realizing that I could run home and get warm — I decided that, yeah, I can be a Giants fan when the Twins aren’t here, even against former Twins.